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CONFRONTING RACISM
This book proposes a comprehensive approach to confronting racism through

a foundational framework as well as practical strategies to correct and reverse
the course of the past and catalyze the stalled efforts of the present. It will do so
by focusing on those specific aspects of law and legal theory that intersect with
psychological research and practice.
In Part I, the historical and current underpinnings of racial injustice and the
obstacles to combating racism are introduced. Part II examines the documented
psychological and emotional effects of racism, including race-based traumatic stress.
In Part III, the authors analyze the application of forensic mental health assessment
in addressing race-related experiences and present a legal and policy framework for
reforming institutional and organizational policies. Finally, in Part IV the authors
advocate for a close, collaborative approach among legal and mental health profes-
sionals and their clients to seek redress for racial discrimination.
Confronting Racism provides a framework for legal, mental health, and other
related social science professionals and leaders to acknowledge and act on the
harmful aspects of our societal systems.
Robert T. Carter, Ph.D., is professor emeritus of psychology and education

at Teachers College, Columbia University. He is also a faculty member of
Columbia University’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.
Thomas D. Scheuermann, M.A., J.D., serves on the Graduate Faculty of

Oregon State University, College of Liberal Arts, where he teaches courses in
legal issues in higher education, and American higher education history.
CONFRONTING RACISM
Integrating Mental Health Research
into Legal Strategies and Reforms
Robert T. Carter and Thomas D. Scheuermann

First published 2020
by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2020 Robert T. Carter and Thomas D. Scheuermann
The right of Robert T. Carter and Thomas D. Scheuermann to be
identified as the authors of the editorial material, and of the authors for
their individual chapters, has been asserted in accordance with sections
77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical,
or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this title has been requested
ISBN: 978-1-138-55324-8 (hbk)

ISBN: 978-1-138-55343-9 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-14856-4 (ebk)
Typeset in Bembo
by codeMantra
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments vii
1 An Introduction to Racism and What It Means

to Confront It 1
PART I
What Do We Know About the History of Racial
Injustice? Historical and Current Underpinnings19
2 Historical and Contemporary Obstacles to

Combating Racism 21
3 Why Legal Redress Has Been So Difficult 41
4 Undoing Civil Rights: Two Steps Forward, One and

a Half Steps Back 69
PART II
Racism Hurts: Psychological and Emotional Costs 93
5 The Harm of Encounters with Racial Discrimination 95
6 Reconceptualizing Racism and Presenting a Theory

of Race-Based Traumatic Stress 120
vi Contents
7 Measuring Race-Based Traumatic Stress Injury as Legally

Actionable Emotional Distress 137
PART III
Where Do We Go from Here? A Model for
Legal Redress 153
8 Forensic Assessment of Race-Based Traumatic Stress 155
9 A Legal and Organizational Framework for Confronting

Racism: Strategies and Reforms for Law, Policy,
and Practice 181
10 Applying the Framework: Confronting Racism and

Advocating for Legal Reform 209
PART IV
Integrating Mental Health and the Law 227
11 Mental Health Evaluations: Race-Related Mental

Health Standards and Practices 229
12 Integrating the Law and Mental Health: Collaborating

to Confront Racism 249
Index 271
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The seed for this book was planted several decades ago, when lawyers contacted
me about being involved in legal cases and I (RTC) was asked to apply my
knowledge of race and racial identity to litigation. In that regard I wish to
thank those who were the first to see my work on race as valuable to legal
proceedings. One also co-authored a chapter on race and family law—and
colleagues Judge Ellen Gesmer Esq., Janet E. Helms (a colleague and co-author
of the initial paper on classes of racism), and Charles Patin, Esq.
TDS and I meet when our mutual friend and colleague, Larry Roper, in-
troduced us during a workshop on racism and race-based traumatic stress that
RTC was presenting and facilitating for the student affairs leadership team at
Oregon State University. The presentation was based on RTC’s paper on race-
based traumatic stress. Six months later, we were invited to jointly present a
session on the mental health and legal aspects of racism at a NASPA (student
affairs in higher education) national conference in Philadelphia. The following
year (2012) we co-authored a law review article on the topic in the University
of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender & Class, and subsequently con-
tinued in our individual research, teaching and writing—sharing ideas and
concepts for further scholarship—until the idea of this book sprouted. Now
that this project is completed, we have many to acknowledge and thank.
First, Larry Roper, who after decades as a leader in college student ser-
vices, is professor in the School of Language, Culture and Society at Oregon
State University—for introducing us and encouraging our work, as well as
reading and commenting on the book manuscript. Likewise, we are grateful
to many colleagues who read part or all of the manuscript and offered invalu-
able guidance and insights on our theories and approaches, including Helen
Neville is a professor of Educational Psychology and African American Studies
viii Acknowledgments
at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she also chairs the

APA approved counseling psychology doctoral program. Gilbert Carrasco at
Willamette University College of Law, Paul James in Duke University’s Office
for Institutional Equity, and Angelo Gomez who recently retired from Oregon
State University after many years of service there and in private law practice.
We are grateful to Kellen Luey and Kyleigh Gray of the Willamette Law Re-
view for their painstaking work checking and fine-tuning the legal citations; to
Patricia Bower for her diligent editorial work in helping us to prepare a man-
uscript worthy to submit to our publisher; and to Nina Guttapalle and Jeanine
Furino at Routledge for their expert guidance and support in the finalizing of
the manuscript.
We are especially appreciative of the love and support that our spouses,
Adrienne and Cesie, provided us throughout the planting and cultivation of
this book project; it has been an effort spanning many seasons, during which
their faith, patience, and encouragement sustained us.
Finally, we acknowledge and thank those countless courageous folks and
activists, leaders, and scholars who throughout our country’s history risked
their lives and livelihoods in, and dedicated their careers to, the cause of call-
ing out racism, boldly confronting it, and educating and enlightening an often
reluctant majority on its evils and costs to the enslaved and the enslaver, and
to the oppressed and the oppressor. Their blood, sweat, and tears have slowly
moved our nation forward—albeit in painful fits and starts—through human
degradation, historical fallacy, and false grandiosity and complacency, as well
as past violent resistance to and arrogant circumvention of the law—toward a
place of living up to the principles of equality, unity, and justice on which the
United States proclaims it was founded. We humbly continue the struggle of
confronting racism and seeking redress for it, and an end to it, standing on the
shoulders of these giants.
Robert T. Carter, Thomas D. Scheuermann

Sept. 3. 2019
1
AN INTRODUCTION TO RACISM AND
WHAT IT MEANS TO CONFRONT IT
In this book, we propose approaches and a framework for confronting racism

by integrating mental health and legal practices. To “confront” means to face,
challenge, or oppose; to accuse; or to deal head-on with something that is
unpleasant. “Racism” has many definitions and meanings that have changed
over time, from the end of the Civil War to the present; for instance, some
would argue that racism was reflected mostly in how people behaved, and rac-
ism was supported and justified with thoughts, belief systems, and scientific
evidence. Definitions vary in focus and connotations depending upon who is
using the term and for what purpose. Racism is connected to individuals as
well as to race and racial groups. Carter and Pieterse (2020) define race as “a
social construction in which people in the United States are identified by their
skin color, language, and physical features and are grouped and ranked into dis-
tinct sociopolitical groups with different degrees of [social] access and opportu-
nity” (see also Marger, 2015). In the United States, racial groups include White
and people of color (including biracial individuals who have a parent who is a
person of color). “People of color” refers to disenfranchised Americans, Blacks,
Latino/as, Asians, and Native Indian Americans (Carter & Pieterse, 2005).
Racism is “the exercise of power against a racial group defined as inferior by
individuals and institutions with the intentional and unintentional support of
the entire (race or) culture” ( Jones & Carter, 1996, p. 3; see also Carter, 2007).
We define racism as a form of personal prejudice in that it involves the use of
group power through organizations and institutions as well as the imposition of
the cultural preferences of the racial group in power. Therefore, in Confronting
Racism, we refer to behaviors, practices, laws, beliefs, and policies that are cre-
ated by the transformation of racial prejudice into individual racism through
the use of power directed against racial groups and their members. Individuals,
2 Racism and What It Means to Confront It
institutional members, and leaders define these racial group members as infe-
rior, which is reflected in policies and laws with the support, both intentional
and unintentional, and participation of the entire dominant racial and cultural
group (Carter, 2007; Hannah-Jones, 2019b). Racial discrimination is the be-
havioral manifestation of racism; it can take distinct forms that have both direct
and indirect harmful mental health effects.
For us, then, confronting racism means to challenge and take head-on the
systems that have been embedded in our laws and our legal and health (phys-
ical and mental) institutions. Racism is a stressor, and it affects the mental and
physical health of its targets. This book focuses on these myriad stressors and
their injurious effects (Williams, 2018).
The rank order of racial groups in colonial America led to social and legal
segregation that lasted for centuries; as a consequence, many groups of color re-
tained distinctive cultural patterns and practices. While learning the culture of
the dominant racial group, people of color also held on to their unique cultural
patterns and values. Thus, race also reflects not only visible physical difference;
it also means that American racial groups differ culturally (Carter & Helms,
1987; Marger, 2015; Stewart & Bennet, 2011).
Dominant American culture is derived from White European American
ethnic group (i.e., country and culture of origin) values and beliefs (Marger,
2015). Some of the cultural norms that undergird the dominant White and
White-identified groups in our society (see: Carter & Pieterse, in press;
Stewart & Bennett, 2011) involve some of these propositions:
1. Social relations are governed by individual preferences over group

needs.
2. Self-expression, measured by external criteria coupled with social confor-
mity, is the basis for recognized personal achievements (e.g., school grades,
good job).
3. Social structures (e.g., families and organizations) are ordered and con-
trolled on the basis of authority and power invested in seniors and elders
(top-down), and communication is valued only when it is verbal and in
standard English form.
4. The focus is on things that are to come or are future oriented, wherein
activities and goals are geared to what is next.
5. Moral and ethical principles are drawn from Judeo-Christian religious
beliefs (e.g., original sin).
6. Family is strictly and narrowly defined as including only immediate
members (nuclear), and other cultural systems are inferior.
7. European American cultural traditions and values hold that only the m
usic,
beauty, and social traditions (e.g. holidays, monuments) from Europe are
the most refined and valued—other music and people who do not adhere
to these standards are less valuable.
Racism and What It Means to Confront It 3
American institutions and professions are designed around the racial-cultural

values and beliefs of the dominant racial-cultural group (White Americans),
including the legal and health systems and the manner of establishing laws
in the society, and even in defining health, both physical and mental (Carter
et al., 2019).
“Mental health” is a key term in our work, so what does it mean? We define
it this way: Mental health is the absence of a psychiatric disorder or one’s ability
to meet the demands of daily living and provide for self and family. Racial-
cultural scholars contend that “traditional Western mental health models have
failed to set standards that would validate the experiences of . . . Americans [of
color who live in] . . . a racist environment” (Landrum-Brown, 1990; p. 113).
Another definition of mental health that we find applicable to our work is “a
state of complete physical, mental and social well-being” wherein individuals
can achieve their potential, cope with life stresses, be productive, and contrib-
ute to their community (World Health Organization [WHO], 2014). Mental
health professionals comprise the helping disciplines of psychology, social work,
education, psychiatry, nursing, public health, counseling, and related areas.
We have described racial groups and noted that the groups are rank ordered,
but there is also a tendency to think and present the groups (e.g., Blacks or
Asians) as a monolithic group, with all members having the same experiences
and attitudes. It is common in the United States to refer to Blacks or to Whites
each as a single demographic group. When a person proclaims his or her race,
this is often thought to reflect their “race identity.” However, while race has
social implications, people often associate race with psychological meaning
from sociodemographic membership. Sociodemographic race has no psycho-
logical meaning, and it says nothing about what a person thinks about his race.
Scholars and researchers have established that there is psychological meaning
to race that is manifested in one’s thoughts, behaviors, and beliefs about their
group membership, and—more important—the thoughts and beliefs can vary
from rejection to integration of one’s race and culture. The psychological mean-
ing and variation of racial group membership is an individual’s racial identity
status, or one’s psychological orientation to their race, and it applies to people
of all racial groups (Carter, 1995; Carter & Johnson, 2019).
With key terms and concepts defined, we now turn to looking back to the
period before the nation was founded to explore both how the law (Constitu-
tion, statutes, court decisions) was established and used, and its effect on various
members of society. Understanding how this history set the stage for the pres-
ent demonstrates our need to confront racism today (Hannah-Jones, 2019a).
Looking Back
In the process of locating and discovering new worlds, the leaders of
European societies invoked international law as a justification for enslaving
and dominating the people they encountered and for taking lands they found
on their journeys across the seas. The European explorers sought wealth
and especially gold and spices presumed to be of great value. Initial contact
between the Europeans and Natives in the New World was characterized
by oppression and domination whether in the Caribbean, Mexico, South
America, or in the early settlements of Virginia and Massachusetts. “When
the Pilgrims came to New England, they too were coming not to vacant
land but to territory inhabited by tribes of Indians” (Zinn, 1990, p. 13). The
rationale for taking the land from those who inhabited it was based on a legal
idea brought from the old world (i.e., land as property). John Winthrop, the
governor of Massachusetts, stated that the Indians had only a “natural right
to it but not a civil right. A natural right did not have legal standing” (Zinn,
1990, p. 13), and therefore, it was lawful and possible to take their land and
lives since they did not have civil rights. A similar fate, based on interna-
tional law, befell Africans who were transported from their homelands to the
New World colonies in North and South A merica and the Caribbean, and
they were subjugated to systems of oppression and racism that persist, albeit
in other forms, to this day. The law, based on English common law, has been
central in erecting the social and political structures of American society as
it was invoked during the exploration and settlements of the colonies. The
law was used to promote the labor needed for colonization in the form of
indentured servants and forced laborers. While the physical health and vital-
ity of laborers (forced and indentured) was an important consideration, there
was little to no concern for their mental health, however; many who were
forced rebelled and some leaped to their deaths rather than accept capture
and being taken to an unknown and strange world. In the New World col-
onies, people of different racial groups interacted with one another, Native
people, Europeans, and Africans, and so on. What seemed important at that
time was less about race and more about religion. Yet in time, race did take
on meaning and significance.
Race differences can have meaning in the way people act and relate to one
another. Fredrickson (1988) defines societal racism as the practice of treat-
ing people as less worthy than others, while systemic racism usually means
an “organized system premised on the categorization and ranking of social
groups into races that devalues, disempowers, and differentially allocates desir-
able societal opportunities and resources to racial groups regarded as inferior”
(Williams & Mohammed, 2013, p. 1153). This book focuses on confronting
racism as it is broadly and specifically manifested, and we use and integrate legal
and psychological strategies and practices to do so.
We propose a framework for confronting racism—through theoretical
approaches and practical strategies—and offer pathways to overcome racism
and its vestiges. In the chapters that follow, we discuss history, scholarship,
policies, and legal approaches that will inform legal, mental health, and other
social science professionals as well as organizational and community leaders.

Our framework and strategies can serve to challenge racism, particularly racial
harassment and discrimination (Carter, 2007; Carter & Scheuermann, 2012),
and confront our systems of racial injustice.
The people and institutions of the United States have put forward many
symbolic efforts to limit racial injustices, from court decisions to laws aimed
at changes in social norms and expectations (Hannah-Jones, 2019b). Even
so, people in general and the legal and social science professions and profes-
sionals in particular have not always been willing participants or partners
in efforts to confront and reduce racism and its effects (Bell, 2000). For the
most part, our history is characterized by decisions about race and racism
being made to promote the interest of Whites (Hannah-Jones, 2019b). The
social science and legal professions, each and together, can be seen, based
on their paucity of meaningful action, as reluctant to actually address how
injurious racism may be to individuals and groups as well as to our broader
society. In many instances, these professionals and the systems in which they
work have, by omission or commission, been antagonistic to furthering
racial equality and racial justice; in some instances, they have been respon-
sible for promoting racial oppression. The history of race and racism in our
society is paradoxical, shameful, and complex, filled with countless exam-
ples of legally sanctioned racial oppression (Bell, 2000; Carter & Helms,
2009). In many documented and often egregious cases, social scientists have
been involved, negligently if not intentionally, in stigmatizing populations
of color as culturally deprived or inferior and, by implication, not worthy
of the effort to fully understand and address their injuries and oppression
(Carter & Forsyth, 2009).
Regarding racial injustice, Bell (2008) observes that “blacks are more likely
to obtain relief for even acknowledged racial injustice” (most racial injustices
are not acknowledged) when the relief serves the ends and best interests, judged
by policymakers, of society. Most people’s attention (both White and Black) is
on the gratitude for the relief, not on the benefit to the country; the attribu-
tions tend to be more about the long struggle that led to the relief. So, the self-
interest in the actions taken is obscured and often overlooked. More important,
action has come to be thought of as indicating something more substantive than
it actually does, and
the relief is viewed as proof that society is indeed just and thus eventually
all racial injustices will be recognized and remedied. . . . The remedy for
blacks appropriately viewed as a “good deal” by policymaking whites often pro-
vides benefits for blacks that are more symbolic than substantive; but substantive
or not, they are often perceived by working class whites as both an un-
earned gift to blacks and a betrayal of poor whites.
(Bell, 2000, p. 31, emphasis added)
A Framework on Which to Build

We join fellow scholars, professionals, and volunteers in working to change the
racist practices of the past and challenge the symbolic efforts to confront racial
injustice. In this book, we present our framework for confronting racism as it
stubbornly continues to thrive in the United States. We identify and discuss the
harm it continues to inflict on individuals, groups, and our society.
Across the parts of our book, we introduce research and discuss how pro-
fessionals and leaders in law, mental health, and other fields identify and work
to seek redress for the harmful effects of racism and racial discrimination.
Our framework and associated strategies can be used to confront racism in its
various settings and forms, including employment, mental and physical health
care, and education (Carter, 2007; Carter, & Scheuermann, 2012). Building
on the work of Bell (2008); West (1994); Delgado and Stefancic (2004); Carter
(2007); Brooks, Carrasco, and Selmi (2011); and others, we discuss legal paths
of redress, and we chart routes to directly and more effectively confront current
systems of racism and racial injustice—systems that are both intentionally (in
effect, de jure) and negligently (essentially, de facto) perpetuated.
Some would argue that racism and racial discrimination ceased with the
Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954 and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, or
even with the election and reelection of our first African American president in
2008 and 2012. The Brown case benefited from the evidence provided by men-
tal health professionals demonstrating the psychological harm wrought by racial
segregation to Black children; more recently, however, such evidence has had
little direct effect on racial discrimination litigation. Since Brown, the salience
of race has ebbed and flowed, from periods of symbolic racial progress and
decreases in racial resentment to a resurgence of racial hostility (Hannah-Jones,
2019a). Indeed, since we began to write this book, there has been a resurgence
of racist speech and acts from White supremacist groups, ordinary citizens, and
the current president of the United States.1
There are reports indicating that in the last few years, there has been more
blatant and open racial hostility directed at people of color, supported by
Whites. The observation is reflected in various incidents and actions that have
occurred across the country. These race-related events indicate that race and
racism continue to be central and disturbing features of U.S. society. More
important, the rise in racial hostility makes confronting racism imperative. To
illustrate, Vera (2018) reports on several incidents in the country that reflect
the increasingly hostile racial environment. In a Starbucks in Philadelphia, two
Black men asked to use the bathroom and were told it was for paying cus-
tomers only. The men were arrested for trespassing after they refused to leave
because they were waiting to meet another person. The company responded
by offering racial bias training to its 8,000 employees across the country. At a
Denny’s restaurant in 2017 in Washington State, a waitress and manager asked
Black men to pay in advance for their meals; the employees were let go by the
company. But the company had a history of racial discrimination. In the mid-
1990s, the company paid $54 million to settle two class-action lawsuits that
claimed the company discriminated against Black customers. The request for
prepayment also happened at an IHOP in Maine, where a group of Black teens
were having a meal. A White customer overheard the request and stepped in
to question the practice and reason for this request. The restaurant apologized
to the teens. There have been additional reports of people calling the police on
Blacks and other people of color simply for having lunch, going to their local
pool, getting something from their car, and so on (Vera, 2018).
These incidents are just the latest in a long history of attempts to maintain
White dominance in the United States. Many people thought that the election
of a Black man as our president in 2008 and 2012 would make race less salient
and that issues and concerns regarding race and racism would have diminished.
Yet evidence to the contrary has emerged to show that race, racial inequality,
and racism remains a central factor in our social and political lives and that con-
siderations regarding race still divide the country. Some have argued that the
rise in racism is related to the election of Donald Trump as the 45th president
of the United States. “Our analysis . . . indicates that Donald Trump success-
fully leveraged existing resentment towards African Americans in combination
with emerging fears of increased racial diversity in American to reshape the
presidential electorate” (Dionne, Ornstein, & Mann, 2017, p. 159). From the
start of his campaign, Donald Trump was explicit about his own racial hostility
and used Whites’ negative racial attitudes to build support for his candidacy for
president. Some of the actions’ taken by his administration and his comments
toward White nationalists (such as the following the Charlottesville, Virginia,
“Unite the Right” protests) fuel fear that he harbors hostility toward people of
color in our country. In starker terms, some suggest that the election of Donald
Trump was in part a reflection of the fear that Whites have of Blacks and other
people of color, a fear that for many is not explicit or even acknowledged.2
Indeed, empirical data supports the role of racial fear and hostility within
voting patterns of the 2016 election. Schaffner, MacWilliams, and Nteta’s
(2018) findings indicate that a strong affiliation with being White and with
being told that people of color would outnumber Whites by 2042 resulted in
these individuals being more likely to support and vote for Donald Trump.
During the first few years of his presidency, social commentator and journalist
Lopez (2017) observes, “racial resentment is driving economic anxiety . . .
[and] racial resentment is the biggest predictor of white vulnerability among
white millennials. Economic variables like education, income and employment
made a negligible difference.”
Therefore, race continues to sprout from its roots in the past to maintain
its current status and to dominate our political reality today. Its central role in
our society means that race continues to have a powerful influence in shaping
American laws, policies, and practices—just as it did when the foundations of

the United States were being established centuries ago. Another indication of
the importance of race is in the debates about the meaning of statues and mon-
uments honoring leaders of the Confederacy.
It has been 150 years since the last shots were fired in the U.S. Civil War,
but a debate still rages over how history will remember the losing side.
Hundreds of statues dedicated to the Confederacy . . . exist all
throughout the Unites States, and often serve as an offensive reminder of
A merican’s history of slavery and racial oppression.
Recent decisions by local governments to remove those memorials
have triggered a backlash from a vocal group of Americans who see their
removal as an attempt to subvert U.S. history and southern culture.3
Although race continues to be a profound and provocative aspect of the

A merican experience, what receives less attention are the myriad ways in which
people are racially oppressed (Feagin, 2014) and the harm that such practices in-
flict on those who are unable to prevent the negative outcomes associated with
segregated educational systems, housing, and employment opportunities as well
as the constant surveillance of non-White communities by law enforcement and
the mass incarceration of Blacks and Latino/as (Alexander, 2012; C arter et al.,
2019). Systemic racism has been a part of U.S. society for centuries, first as slav-
ery and racial segregation, and today as overt and covert p ractices of racial dis-
crimination that are harmful to individuals and groups of color (Carter, 2007;
Carter, & Scheuermann, 2012; Kendi, 2017). In the m id-20th century, tradi-
tional or old-fashioned (legally sanctioned) racism abated for a short time and
then was reasserted in various forms disguised as something other than race,
such as social class or cultural disadvantage (Moynihan, 1965). Now, in the
21st century, issues of racism in many areas of everyday life have resurfaced,
and the overt expressions of racial hostility have come back as reflected in
national and local media coverage and other actions (i.e., court decisions and
litigation). Racism has recently been implicated in law enforcement, higher
education, health care, housing, and employment. For example, consider the
events regarding racist comments, symbols, and songs on college campuses, and
reflect on the protests by racial minority college and university students occur-
ring across the country (Wilkerson, 2015). There has also been a weakening
of voting rights for people of color (Lichtman, 2018; Rutenberg, 2015), and
racial discrimination in housing continues to be encountered by many people
of color (Editorial Board, 2015; Rothstein, 2017; Walker, Spohn, & DeLone,
2012). Following the killing of unarmed African American men and women
by law enforcement officers in New York, Cleveland, Ferguson, Baltimore,
Tulsa, and other cities (Funke & Susman, 2016), there is growing awareness
of the persistent disparities in the treatment of people of color and immigrants
in the areas of health, civic engagement, and the criminal justice systems. The
realities of race and racism require that we confront systemic r acism as well as
confront racist behaviors. We highlight the connections to racism in our coun-
try’s history and its economic, social, political, and educational systems. We
argue that racism results in emotional and psychological harm. Our framework
for confronting racism includes addressing individual and corporate behavior,
and proposes remedies and forms of redress for legally actionable racial harass-
ment and racial discrimination.
BOX 1.1
In two years, for the first time in U.S. history, less than half the children in
the nation will be white. So, let’s talk about what’s working when it comes
to race, and what isn’t. Let’s examine why we continue to segregate along
racial lines and how we can build inclusive communities. Let’s confront
today’s shameful use of racism as a political strategy and prove we are
better than this.
—Susan Goldberg, editor in chief, National Geographic, April 20184
If in America today all overt racism and racism perpetrated by one in-
dividual toward another would cease (i.e., there were no more “racists” as
popularly conceived and portrayed), that would indeed be a wonderful and
enormous step forward for our country. We as a nation would still, however,
have significant challenges—including historic and continuing systems of
often subtle but still real oppression—yet ahead of us to overcome in order to
rise to a place of true equal opportunity and equity and to chart a broad, bold
course toward equality for all as espoused in our laws and pronouncements
of greatness.
As a society and in our institutions, we need new and innovative approaches
to confronting racism, strategies with an underlying ethic for achieving redress
for those harmed by racial discrimination, harassment, and its other manifes-
tations. To that end, we build on mental health and psychological research
and practice, and integrate these findings into framing and constructing legal
strategies that together comprise a robust path for legal reform and legal redress
(Carter & Scheuermann, 2012).
This text focuses on those specific aspects of the law and legal theory and
principles that intersect with psychological research and practice—as distinct
from many other books on race, racism, and the law that focus on a partic-
ular area of the law and illustrate how race influences legal outcomes, for
example, criminal law and criminal justice (Barrett & George, 2005; Delgado,
Stefancic, & Harris, 2001; Russell, 1998; Wang, 2006), housing, persistent
de facto racism, the effects of historically de jure segregation, and wealth dispar-
ity (Rothstein, 2017).
Social science and mental health scholars (i.e., in psychology and psychi-
atry) have begun to conduct meta-analyses of discrimination’s health effects
to address the contextual issues of how unfair treatment and discrimination
affects people’s mental health (e.g., Pieterse, Todd, Neville & Carter, 2012).
Less attention, however, has been directed by these scholars at racism and racial
discrimination. Health and mental health researchers and scholars have also
undertaken to address how discrimination and racism operate in various situa-
tions, organizations, and systems, and they have documented its health effects.
For instance, researchers in public health have been studying the effects of
discrimination in the delivery of health care (Pascoe & Richman, 2009), and
psychologists have investigated the impact of discrimination in the workplace
(Shavers et al., 2012). More recently, researchers have added racial discrimi-
nation as a focus of their efforts to understand its health effects (Carter, Lau,
Kirkinis & Johnson, 2017; Carter et al., 2019). Deeply troubling disparities
between the maternal and infant mortality rates of White and Black moth-
ers and their babies in the United States (and other countries) are also being
brought more clearly in to focus, with race-related stress being a key health risk
for e xpectant mothers who are Black (see Villarosa, 2018).
Legal and Mental Health Strategies and Systems: Linked

Conceptually but Not Effectively in Practice
We propose to confront racism by integrating legal theory and practices with
mental health research and practice, informed by a review of our country’s
racist history, laws, systems, and practices. Since the civil rights era, efforts to
limit racial discrimination in society have stalled, as has legal redress for people
who have experienced stress and psychological injury through racism, racial
discrimination, and racial harassment. We show how U.S. post–Civil War his-
tory (when key constitutional amendments and civil rights laws were ratified
or passed) and the events of the past half century (since the passage of the
1964 Civil Rights Act) have shaped the ways in which racial issues and racial
encounters are currently handled through our legal system, including federal
and state legislation and the courts as well as our social and educational systems.
Legal scholars (e.g., Bell 2000, 2008; Chew & Kelly, 2006) have pointed
out how racial issues have been neglected by their fellow legal scholars and
dismissed by the courts. Chew and Kelly as well as Bell have critically analyzed
how race has been viewed and acted upon (or dismissed or disparaged) under
the law. Social scientists have also described the complex set of phenomena
that results from race and racism, yet only a few researchers and scholars have
focused on how to assess the individual for emotional and psychological harm
from specific racial acts and events. Likewise, legal professionals and social
scientists have not offered ways to confront racism that have been, in our view,
consistently effective. To that end, we present and discuss mental health and
psychological evidence that has not been employed in the past to confront rac-
ism (Carter & Forsyth, 2009; Carter & Pieterse, in press; Hicks, 2004).
We explain how racism is harmful by drawing on evidence that demon-
strates its negative and damaging effects on individuals. We document psycho-
logical and emotional effects of racism, specifically in the form of race-based
traumatic stress injury. We contend that fundamental to understanding and
confronting racism is the clear and compelling documentation of how racism
hurts people, and we offer methods to assess the harm, including specific emo-
tional and psychological harms.
Although it may be difficult to accept and painful to confront, racism is not
a practice engaged in solely by White supremacists or radical individuals and
groups. It is part of our national culture and identity. That is, race and racism
are part of our national “genetic makeup” (see U.S. Constitution, pre-13th
Amendment) and are embedded into our institutions and traditions.
The U.S. Constitution was written to explicitly and arithmetically devalue
Blacks (and other racial groups who were slaves), calculating their worth as
3/5ths of a person (Art. I, sec. 2) and mandating that slaves who escaped must
be returned to their owners (Art. IV, sec. 2). The 13th Amendment (ratified
in 1865) has a caveat clause that actually permits slavery “as punishment for
crime.” And the rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitutional Amendments
14th and 15th (ratified in 1868 and 1870, respectively)—including the right of
emancipated slaves to not be discriminated against by race; and equal rights,
and “the power to vote” (Livingston, 2016)5 —have been under nearly constant
attack and dilution from the time of Reconstruction until the present. Attacks
have come in the form of enacting voter identification laws and culling of voter
rolls that effectively reduces the participation of people of color, and redrawing
congressional districts to limit the participation of poor and Black voters (e.g.,
with literacy tests and threatened violence; Bell, 2008; Kendi, 2017; Livingston,
2016).6
Since the establishment of slavery and the use of lynching to control Blacks
in the South, through segregation and constitutionally approved discrimina-
tion (Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537, 1896), to attacks on every legal remedy to
reduce the effects of racism, and systemic racial oppression of people of color—
those in power and the people of the White majority culture throughout our
history have sought to justify the beliefs, policies, and actions that have infused
racism into our national psyche and character (Kendi, 2017).
This is particularly surprising and disturbing given that racism harms both
the perpetrator and the target, the oppressed as well as the oppressor (Bella,
1995; West, 1994). Indeed, we see racism as a national endeavor, albeit one that
many of us do not—or for various reasons refuse to—recognize as one of the
nation’s own making (Hannah-Jones, 2019b). To comprehensively address this
structural feature of our society, we propose legal and mental health approaches
that can be applied to a range of settings and situations (e.g. civil rights, dis-
crimination, health care, tort liability, affirmative action, and employment) as
well as criminal justice and related challenges.
It is indeed painful and often disorienting to acknowledge and confront the
truth, particularly about oneself, one’s community, and one’s country. As that
happens, however, we believe that most of us will realize that it is unconsciona-
ble to support or tacitly accept the policies and actions of a nation that, although
it has many strengths and laudable qualities, stubbornly perpetuates racism and
discrimination while boasting that it champions equal rights, freedom, and un-
limited opportunities. And we will, if we do not already, come to realize that
racism must be confronted and overcome by each of us and by our society and
nation—for the “general welfare” (see U.S. Constitution, Preamble).
On an individual or group level, consider your reactions to the terms “race,”
“racism,” “discrimination,” “slavery,” “reparation and reconciliation,” and
“White privilege.” Recall how those around you have responded when any
of these topics have come up in social or professional discourse, in the news,
or in your community. And then ask yourself: Are we in a post-r acial society?
Are people of all races in the United States, currently on a level playing field in
terms of education, housing, employment, health care, voting rights, and the
criminal justice system? Do we all have equal opportunity or equality—even
under the law, as it is enacted, interpreted, and applied to various individuals
and groups? Recent research and reports would suggest otherwise, including
those from the Pew Research Center and the Equal Employment Opportu-
nity Commission (EEOC, 2017). For example, fully twice as many Blacks as
Whites believe that “White people benefit from advantages in society that
Black people do not have,” and there were over 32,000 complaints filed in
2016 with the EEOC for employment discrimination based on race (“race”
was the basis for over one-third of all workplace discrimination complaints;
EEOC, 2017).
For many people, racism is an ambiguous concept, with an opaque and
sometimes shifting meaning. We believe that in order to effectively confront
racism and its deleterious consequences, it is necessary that new, more powerful
and yet feasible strategies be put into action, strategies that combine legal and
mental health practices. In that spirit, our framework and approach to confront
racism:
a facilitates awareness and recognition of the realities of racist encounters

by targeted individuals and others, whether in systemic, overt, or subtle
forms;
b provides a guide for legal and mental health challenges and claims, and a
framework for confronting and dismantling obstacles to achieving racial
justice; and
c informs and guides research to gain a fuller understanding of the expe-

riences of both the targets of racism who have brought claims, and those
who work on their behalf in legal and administrative processes as well as
other milieus, to achieve awareness of and redress for racism.
A Unique Focus: Concepts and Strategies at the

Intersection of Law and Mental Health
This book contributes to and expands on the existing and growing literature
on race, mental health, and the law. Our contribution is unique in that it in-
volves the integration of the law and mental health in focused approaches to
confronting racism. Our text provides guidance to an array of legal profes-
sionals, administrators, and leaders at various levels, including managers and
practitioners, faculty, and students. Our approach is practical, although we
realize that making and even advocating for changes to the status quo will be a
persistent, if not painful and frustrating, challenge.7
Our goal in presenting this framework is to assist others in the development
of more efficacious legal and social policies and practices. We hope that this
book will be useful as a text in undergraduate and graduate courses in criminal
justice, political and other social sciences, and applied psychology as well as by
law schools and social work programs, practicing lawyers, and mental health
professionals. We hope that this volume can also serve as a valuable resource for
internal training units in government agencies, schools or colleges, businesses,
and community advocacy groups.
This book begins by addressing some basic questions: “How did we get
here?” which is critical to our understanding of racism, and “Where are we
now?” which presents a set of challenges that stare us in the face. And the
question following from these is: “What are we going to do about those
challenges?”
The Book Is Organized into Four Parts

Part 1, What Do We Know About the History of Racial Injustice? – This
part begins with an overview of legal efforts to establish racial justice. Then
we describe the obstacles that have been constructed and supported and that
make the path toward racial justice difficult to travel. This part ends in the
present.
Part 2, Racism Hurts: Psychological and Emotional Costs: The second
part presents the emotional and psychological costs of racism and its associated
violence and forms of oppression. Race-based traumatic stress injury is pre-
sented as a type of emotional distress that may be legally actionable on the bases
of intentional and negligent tort liability, a harm for which there should be
more effective avenues to legal redress. So that costs can be connected to racial
encounters and their mental health effects, we propose a framework through

which more people can become aware of the harms of racism and can take up
the work to prevent and confront it.
Part 3, Where Do We Go from Here? A Model for Legal Redress: The third
part introduces both broad and specific approaches, including a framework for
integrating various aspects of the law, policy, and practice, coupled with mental
health guidelines to assist in recognizing, assessing, and addressing race-based
emotional stress. In this part, we argue for recognition of hostile racism as being
distinct from avoidant racism, with each having unique attributes and resultant
harms.
Part 4, Overcoming Raical Injustice-Integrating Mental Health and the
Law: The final part presents a framework for analysis as well as specific rec-
ommendations, references, and resources for education, training, communica-
tions, and practice in the legal as well as mental health and related fields.
We invite the reader to accompany us on our journey of exploration and
reflection, confrontation and construction, progress and reconciliation. We are
deeply grateful to the pioneers of this sojourn—activists and warriors, scholars
and organizers both famous and anonymous. We humbly stand on their sturdy
shoulders and hope our work does them justice.
Notes
1 On increasing hate crimes, see “Ten Ways to Fight Hate: A Community Re-
sponse Guide” (August 14, 2017), Southern Poverty Law Center website, https://
www.splcenter.org; on President Donald Trump’s Twitter account and activity,
see Marcin (2017); and on the president’s archived tweets regarding accusations
of racism, see Ingraham (2017). See also, CBS News, Hate Groups Hit New High,
Up 30 Percent in Last 4 Years, Southern Poverty Leadership Center Reports, February
20, 2019, retrieved from: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/southern-poverty-
law-center-new-hate-map-data-g roup-increase-splc-intel ligence-repor t-
today-2019-02-20/
2 See for example President Trump’s tweets of July 14, 2019 admonishing four mem-
bers of the U.S. House of Representatives – all women of color, all U.S. citizens:
“So interesting to see “Progressive” Democrat Congresswomen, who originally
came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the
worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a func-
tioning government at all), now loudly… …and viciously telling the people of the
United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our govern-
ment is to be run. Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and
crime infested places from which they came. Then come back and show us how…”;
and some reactions to these messages: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/
what-americans-think-of-trumps-go-back-to-your-country-tweets
3 “Why the Fuss over Confederate Statues?” BBC, August 17, 2017, retrieved from
www.bbc.com. See also: Equal Justice Initiative (2018) Confederate Iconography in the
20th Century, retrieved from https://segregationinamerica.eji.org/report/confederate-
icongraphy.html
4 See National Geographic Special Issue on race, Black and White, April 2018.
5 State approaches to felon disenfranchisement vary tremendously. In Maine and

Vermont, felons never lose their right to vote, even while they are incarcerated.
In Florida, Iowa, and Virginia, felons and ex-felons permanently lose their right
to vote. Virginia and Florida have supplementary programs that facilitate guber-
natorial pardons. The remaining states each have their own approaches to the issue
(National Conference of State Legislatures, www.ncsl.org/research/elections-and-
campaigns/felon-voting-rights.aspx, retrieved September 19, 2017).
6 Indeed, since the most recent major amendment to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, in
1991, rights have been interpreted more narrowly and, in some cases, as no longer
being necessary, See Livingston (2016), and: The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights Ex-
presses Concern Regarding Federal Civil Rights Enforcement Efficacy and Priorities, www.
usccr.gov/press/2017/06-16-Efficacy-of-Federal-Civil-Rights-Enforcement.pdf,
June 16, 2017.
7 We take heart and strength in the struggle from those giants on whose shoulders we
seek to stand, including Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Thurgood Marshall,
Rosa Parks, and Derrick Bell, who risked—as the Declaration of Independence
signatories pledged—their “lives, fortunes, and sacred honor” to advance justice for
those denied it.
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Table of Cases
Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896)
Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954)
PART I
What Do We Know About the
History of Racial Injustice?
Historical and Current Underpinnings
2
HISTORICAL AND CONTEMPORARY
OBSTACLES TO COMBATING RACISM
To confront something and challenge it head-on, it is advisable to understand

what you are challenging in the event that it shifts and changes its shape and
form. If you know it and its nature, then it is possible to recognize it regardless
of the form it may take. Racism is a set of beliefs and actions that were embed-
ded into our social, political, and economic systems even prior to the inception
of the nation. Racism has been historically tied to, and continues to be linked
to, the economic self-interests of members of the White American race and
culture and to White-identified people, that is, people of color who are psycho-
logically invested in White culture (Carter, 1995; Kendi, 2017).
It is imperative that our comprehension of racism be based on an under-
standing of our social systems and how people in those systems historically were
treated and regarded. We need to avoid the trap of thinking and behaving as
if racism is located only in a person, and avoid the temptation to locate racial
beliefs and actions in the individual or render such acts as aberrant behavior of
a person or as personal hate or bias. One formidable obstacle is the denial that
racism operates beyond the thoughts and actions of an individual – because it is
also systemic. It would not be possible to hold a people in bondage based solely
on the attitudes and beliefs of individuals. Nor would it be possible to defeat
Mexicans and annex their country or conquer Native Indians simply because
some individuals thought and believed these people were not worthy of the
freedoms and independence reserved for White men (and, by extension, White
women). Rather, it was necessary for the majority of people to act on shared
beliefs and convictions about people of color as evidenced by their electing
officials and representatives who would pass laws and promulgate ideas and
policies that rendered the non-Whites as not deserving of humane treatment,
and who interjected this notion into systems and policies. They who are not
22 What Do We Know About the History of Racial Injustice?
White were, in the majority view, subhuman or savages and needed to be con-
trolled. Nonetheless, and more important, many people during the course of
history have pushed back against the prevailing notions about people of color,
and many more fought to lift them up and to protect their rights (Finkelman,
2018; Lepore, 2018). As we look back to identify obstacles to removing neg-
ative racial distinctions and racism, we learn that racial distinctions were not
so important during the early years in the colonies; religion was more central
to the settlers’ lives. Racial group membership and racial differences, in time
however, came to shape and form many aspects of our country as it developed,
and racial group membership became more salient as an obstacle to achieving
justice and equality (Hannah-Jones, 2019).
Looking Back
Race was not an important characteristic in the New World colonies, but it
became so later as the United States emerged and grew. Racial group mem-
bership as a form of oppression evolved over time and later was justified and
rationalized to support its continuation. In the early years of the colonies,
people who provided labor were indentured servants, and people of all col-
ors and religious backgrounds held the status of servant (Fredrickson, 1988).
Historians tell d ifferent stories of what happened during these early years
regarding who was and was not indentured or who was and was not a captive
(Bennett, 1998; Dodson, 2002; Fredrickson, 1988; Thornton, 2012). Some
contend that racial differences were salient at the outset, while others argue
that race and racism took time to take hold. What matters is how were people
treated; while some could say it is less of an issue in the nature of the justifi-
cation behind how p eople were treated. But the justifications do matter since
many employed at the outset of racial oppression are still used in the present
(Silverstein, 2019).
Fredrickson (1988) argues that racism as conscious belief and ideology and as
an elaborate system should be distinguished from individual prejudice, which,
he notes, is a matter of personal feeling and discrimination, a behavior. Said
another way, people hold prejudices and act in discriminatory ways for various
reasons; some related to skin color, some to religion, some to gender. Fredrick-
son believes that racism can be characterized by unequal relationships between
racial groups, where one treats the other as inferior and unworthy of free will
and equality. A position that was adopted from the time Africans arrived in
the colonies (Hannah-Jones, 2019). He argues that implicit or societal racism
based on actual social relations—that is, how people treated one another—was
prevalent for centuries and was not supported by elaborate ideological justifica-
tions like the ones that emerged in the 19th and 20th centuries. Thus, societal
racism existed, and social relationships were determined by these unquestioned
relationships and prejudices and, as such, were obstacles to racial justice.
Obstacles to Combating Racism 23
It is important to remember that many nations and countries have engaged

in slavery (Thornton, 2012). While this fact is not commonly discussed, it is
the case that “slavery as a system of labor organization and exploitation had de-
veloped in antiquity, Ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome, ancient China as well
as the Inca and the Aztec cultures . . . and in Africa” (Dodson, 2002, p. 21),
but these systems were not based on race, and many of these systems were not
designed to generate profit and capital from the forced labor (Franklin & Moss,
2000). The slave trade as we know it took place from the 1400s (15th century)
through the 1800s (19th century).
The transatlantic slave trade was central to the development of the Eu-
ropean colonial economics [not when the trade began] in the Americas
from the 16th to the 19th centuries. . . . It was central to the development
of the modern world as we know it. . . . The trade established economic,
political, social, and cultural relations among peoples in Africa, Europe,
and the Americas. . . . The trade . . . fostered the material development
of elite in Europe and Africa as well as European colonial elite in North,
Central, and South America and the Caribbean.
(Dodson, 2002, p. 22)
“Of the 6.5 million who crossed the Atlantic and settled in the Americas during
the colonial period (1492–1776), for instance, only 1 million were Europeans.
The other 5.5 million were Africans” (Dodson, 2002, p. 13). Of the A fricans
(about 10 million) transported to the New World colonies, only a small fraction
(about 450,000), who survived the middle passage, arrived in North America.
The small number of Africans grew to be 4 million by 1860 and today to
about 40 million or so. The majority of Africans were transported to South
American countries and Caribbean islands (Harding, 1981; Morgan, 1998;
Silverstein, 2019).
From the time of early contact with Africa and before Europeans arrived in
the British American colonies, Europeans had a negative perception of A fricans,
Mexicans, and Native Indians because these people were different from them in
appearance and cultural practices. For instance, Black and Brown were equated
with uncivilized people, and Black was associated with evil in the language and
customs of Europeans. However, “between 1619 and 1640, a small n umber of
blacks [who were captives] were introduced into Virginia as servants. Some,
and perhaps most, of these early arrivals were freed after a limited term of
service,” as was the case with most indentured servants irrespective of race
(Fredrickson, 1988, p. 193; Kendi, 2017).
The debate continues about whether the Africans in the colonies were
slaves from the outset. There is also debate about what factors contributed to
their eventual status. Some contend that international law meant that Afri-
cans were slaves regardless of where they were taken; others argue that race
prejudice combined with physical differences were the determining factors

that sealed the fate of Africans to be enslaved (Bennett, 1998; Dodson, 2002;
Kendi, 2017). Over the course of some two decades in the early years of the
colonies, by 1640, a major obstacle to racial justice was established: life as a
servant was built into colonial law. While the ideas about race and race re-
lations were still in flux, it was clear that White and African servants were
treated differently, and thus, one could infer they were seen as different, with
Africans being viewed as inferior (Hannah-Jones, 2019). This is illustrated
by the story of the treatment of three colonial-era servants who had escaped
from their responsibilities; two White and one Black. All three were captured
and punished; the two White indentured servants had years added to their
contracts, but the Black servant was forced to remain in service for the rest of
his life (Dodson, 2002).
The racial distinctions in practice or in daily living were followed by statutes
that laid the foundation for making slavery part of the fabric of the country.
These laws were—and their vestiges continue to be—obstacles to racial justice
and fairness; they are deeply embedded in our history, legal, and social systems
(Silverstein, 2019).
Initially, colonies passed laws that were opposite to English common law
which was usually followed in the colonies. For instance, children, in English
common law, are linked to their fathers’ status, yet Virginia’s 1662 common law
allowed the status of Black children to be determined by their mothers’ status,
so that any child born to a slave woman (even if the father was a White slave-
holder) would be deemed a slave. This change in the law achieved two goals: it
increased the supply of slaves, and it maintained the racial distinctions between
enslaved and free persons. As other colonies followed this law with statutes of
their own aimed at further racial distinctions such as specifically forbidding
interracial marriages and relationships, the obstacles to justice grew in number
and were aimed at fundamental areas of life, family, and relationships. In 1664,
Maryland enacted a law which mandated that if a White woman married a
Black man, she could be enslaved along with him. In 1705, Massachusetts fol-
lowed with their own laws banning interracial relationships. It was in 1691 that
an explicit slave code was established, in South Carolina, that defined slaves
as people who were Negro or Indian. By 1700, other colonies followed suit.
But it took another 50 years for the slave’s status as property to be established
(Horton & Horton, 2005).
Africans were set apart from the White European colonists, and it was
societal racism—the belief, conviction, and practice that Blacks were inferior
because of their race—that led to them being treated accordingly. Prior to
emergence of ideological arguments that Blacks were inferior, this was taken
for granted and required little justification; so this was this norm for over 200
years, and societal racism operated with little active or ideological rationale
other than those found in religion (Horton & Horton, 2005).
As time passed and as colonists advocated for their liberty from British or
European rulers, some argued that the colonies should live up to their pro-
fessed principles of equality and freedom and should abolish slavery and all
it represented. Horton and Horton (2005) observe that “a small but growing
number of white Americans questioned the compatibility of slavery and the
ideal of freedom during the 1760s and 1770s, [and] enslaved and free African
Americans . . . [ joined] the protests for liberty” (p. 54). Some events during this
time created hurdles while others promoted freedom and equality for all. Afri-
cans worked hard to advocate for their rights to be free, as did many colonists
and colonial leaders. Before and after the American Revolution, colonies (later
states) in the North began to abolish slavery, and barriers to racial justice and
equality were removed—at least it appeared to be so in the Northern region
of the country. “Many white Americans, particularly in the northern states,
had become convinced that slavery had no place in a new nation being built
on the principles of freedom. Vermont outlawed human bondage in its state
constitution in 1777” (Horton & Horton, 2005, p. 66). A few years later, Mas-
sachusetts (in 1783) and Rhode Island and Connecticut (in 1784) also outlawed
slavery. The push and pull around slavery took many turns, including acts that
prohibited importation of slaves and restrictions on the slave system’s growth
as the country expanded (Finkelman, 2018). The colonists declared themselves
to be independent of the British authorities and fought to be free of British
rule. In the process, they formed a government and established a republic “for
and by the people,” but they did not agree on what to do about slavery. The
economies of the southern colonies were more dependent on slave labor, while
the north had fewer slaves and a more diverse economy. A central issue during
the Constitutional Convention was how slaves were to be counted for repre-
sentation in the Congress (Franklin & Moss, 2000). An agreement was reached
that pleased no one: slaves would be counted as three-fifths of a person. With
Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution of the United States, the institution of
slavery was embedded in our country’s foundation. Efforts to dismantle slavery
were successful in some states, but slavery’s defenders rallied to erect barriers
and rationales for its continuance. The U.S. Constitution (1787), ratified by all
thirteen of the original states by 1790, kept the system of slavery in place from
the American Revolution to the Civil War. Not only did it count slaves as
three-fifths of a person, it also levied a tax on each slave, but this tax was never
acted upon and the transatlantic trade was allowed to continue after being sus-
pended by the colonies prior to the conflict with the British (Finkelman, 2018;
Franklin & Moss, 2000).
Finkelman (2018) notes that some argued that the Constitution was a
pro-slavery document; the way slaves were counted gave Southern states con-
siderable power. “The creation of the Electoral College was also directly tied
to slavery” (p. 15) since the count of slaves increased congressional represen-
tation from the Southern states. In fact, due to this provision “southerners . . .
dominated the presidency from 1789 to 1861” (Finkelman, 2018, p. 15). The
system was maintained, and its supporters gained political power and protec-
tion from provisions in the Constitution and the courts (Finkelman, 2018). It
was not necessary until the 19th century to present an ideological justification
for slavery, but when the intellectual rationale was offered and promoted and
codified into law, it operated as a significant barrier to racial justice.
Supporters of the slave system and the status quo advocated and promulgated
explicit racism, which Fredrickson defines as “a public ideology based on the
doctrinaire conception of the black man as a natural underling [that] developed
therefore directly out of the need to defend slavery against nineteenth-century
humanitarianism” (Fredrickson 1988, p. 204). However, the racist ideology
was most ascendant at the end of the 19th century, when it was justified by
science, a view that compounded the religious justifications of the past (Kendi,
2017).
Racist ideology, a major hindrance to racial justice, was fueled by efforts
in the South during the 1890s to establish legal segregation and Black oppres-
sion on those who, 30 years before (in 1863), had been freed from slavery. It
is clear that the long story of American racism—“first as a way of life [societal
racism] and then as a system of thought [racial oppression or explicit racism]”
(Fredrickson, 1988, p. 205)—had not ended. The fact that racial feelings have
shifted and changed over time is clear; most people have rejected ideas of racial
inferiority of people of color and the barriers erected to prevent people of
color from social participation. How people react and feel about race and race
relations has changed in some ways but not in others. We can conclude, then
as is true now, that “America . . . was not born racist; it became so gradually as
the result of a series of crimes against black humanity [and other Americans of
color] that stemmed primarily from selfishness, greed, and the pursuit of priv-
ilege” ( Fredrickson, 1988, p. 205) and Whites’ self-interest.
Yet, not all Americans participated in this system, and many rejected it and
all that it represented. Many today would find it shocking to learn that the
courts played a key role in the continuation of racism, racial oppression, and
slavery—a fact that has been a significant obstacle to achieving racial justice
(Finkelman, 2018).1
The Past Informs the Present

We who live in the United States today know something about racism, partic-
ularly in its overt forms. It is inextricably intertwined in our history, from the
time when we were a loose collection of colonies to the present day. We are
aware that racial discrimination exists; some of us have experienced racism and
some have witnessed it, and others have engaged in it. Racism is e videnced in
various forms, from direct person-to-person racist words and actions, to inten-
tional exclusion of certain categories of people, to advocating racial separation
and violence against people of color, to systems of racial oppression. Our coun-
try was founded during a time of—and for well over 100 years before the
Constitution was established, grew and prospered from—legally sanctioned
and widely accepted enslavement of human beings (mainly Native and African
people). For nearly two centuries after the founding of the United States, most
White people in our country continued to thrive directly or indirectly through
the segregation and intentional subjugation (often violent) of, as well as con-
stitutionally sanctioned discrimination against, African Americans and other
people of color. Essentially, today (and since the Brown v. Board of Education
case in 1954 and the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and federal laws that followed 2)
we live in a country where de jure segregation (i.e., legally sanctioned segrega-
tion) and discrimination are prohibited by law but not always in fact or reality.
Indeed, two decades into the 21st century, race is a significant aspect of our
society in the United States perhaps as nowhere else in the world, particularly
in terms of our laws and behaviors—in contrast to our espoused principles as a
nation. In order to confront it, we also must understand how deep the roots of
racism reside in our past and in our thinking.
BOX 2.1
“Let us use history to inspire us to push a country forward, to help us

believe that all things are possible and to demand a country lives up to its
stated ideals.”
–Lonnie G. Bunch III, 14th Secretary of the Smithsonian3
To understand racism (and discrimination and related ills) and its impact on
people, one would do well to learn about the history of racism in the United
States in all its forms (see Bell, 2008; Kendi, 2017). For most adult Americans,
our understanding of the real history of our country—which includes slav-
ery, segregation, Jim Crow laws,4 and racial discrimination—is incomplete if
not erroneous, and often a fantasy in its distortion or understatement of what
actually happened. This is disturbing but not surprising in a system set up
to be—and that arguably remains—supportive of White European American
organizations and systems that have subjugated Americans of color. Rothstein
(2017), for example, notes the importance of history as foundational to our
knowledge of de jure versus de facto segregation, with housing as a key example.
“With very rare exceptions, textbook after textbook adopts the same mythol-
ogy” (p. 200), that is, that segregation in housing was primarily due to Blacks’
decisions to live apart and Whites’ discrimination against them that kept them
out of White neighborhoods. Seldom is the notion expressed that in fact much
of the segregation was dictated by federal, state, and local government agencies.
Rothstein (2017) meticulously documents how our leaders and representatives
in the federal government, including in the Federal Housing Administration,
Public Works Administration and other agencies, openly and intentionally dis-
criminated against Black Americans (pp. 198–202). Many of the acts of dis-
crimination evidenced even today in employment, education, and health care
can be traced to intentional de jure housing and ubiquitous racial segregation
across all areas of life in the country (Kochhar & Fry, 2014).5
BOX 2.2
When people speak about race, usually they seem to be referring to skin
color and, at the same time, to something much more than skin color. This
is the legacy of people such as [19th-century doctor Samuel] Morton, who
developed the “science” of race to suit his own prejudices and got the ac-
tual science totally wrong. Science today tells us that visible differences be-
tween peoples are accidents of history. They reflect how our ancestors dealt
with sun exposure and not much else (Kolbert, 2018, p. 40).
Obstacles to Confronting and Combating Racism

Efforts to confront and combat racism have been, and we expect will con-
tinue to be, met with a plethora of obstacles. But overcoming racism and its
manifestations in our country—including segregated schools, employment dis-
crimination, violence, and criminal injustice—will not be easy. The work to
be done to fully achieve our national ideals of equal protection under the laws
(included in the U.S. Constitution’s 14th Amendment) and a recognition that
all persons are equal and have inalienable rights (as stated in the Declaration of
Independence) will likely prove to be a most challenging undertaking.
Laws that have been enacted long ago, and recently, by both federal and state
governments as well as entrenched policies and practices in hiring, education,
and residential zoning—while some appear to be “race neutral,” the laws’ appli-
cations have disproportionately affected people of color (for example, new “voter
ID” laws in many states)—may reinforce and exacerbate racism and discrimina-
tion. Rothstein (2017) notes that Congress adopted civil rights laws in the 1950s
and 1960s to confront and combat discrimination in areas such as employment,
voting, accommodations, and transportation. He also points out the daunt-
ing level of complexity in remedying various types of discrimination, positing
that “ending de jure segregation of housing requires undoing past actions that
may seem irreversible” (p. 177; see also Oshinsky, 2017). Historical segregation
and discrimination—from housing policies of the federal government, to local
restrictive zoning ordinances, to collaboration among racist realtors—have con-

tributed to segregation in schools and transportation and to discrimination in
employment opportunities and hiring (Oshinsky, 2017; Rothstein, 2017).
According to critical race scholars, “any rule that takes the same approach to
invidious and benign racial classifications stabilizes existing racial disparities by
making it exceedingly difficult for lawmakers to compensate victims of discrim-
ination or promote diversity through direct race-based subsidies” (Bell, 2008,
p. 12). Arguments against affirmative action include, for example, those made by
Chief Justice John Roberts of the U.S. Supreme Court in 2007: “The way to stop
discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race”
(Parents Involved in Community Schools, 20076). While based on an interpretation
of statutes and case law, this ruling seems to be ahistorical and an understatement
of the horrors of legally sanctioned racist practices that were prevalent for well
over a century and that were explicitly prohibited only relatively recently (see
Brown v. Board of Education, 1954; Civil Rights Act, 1964) – by equating them
to good faith (albeit controversial) efforts to advance integration and diversity.
Contrast Chief Justice John Roberts’ rationale in Parents Involved with that of
the late Justice Harry Blackmun’s perspective:
In order to get beyond racism, we must first take account of race. There
is no other way. And in order to treat some persons equally, we must treat
them differently. We cannot—we dare not—let the Fourteenth Amend-
ment perpetuate racial supremacy.
(Blackmun, dissent in Regents of the University of
California v. Bakke, 1978)
It is daunting to confront something that the law holds cannot be considered.

We agree with Justice Blackmun that the judicious use of race can in some
cases be a valid policy consideration. We reject arguments that say we should
never consider race and that to be “race-neutral” is an irrefutable ideal, in part
because racism hurts, and to heal its pain, we must acknowledge its presence.
Pitts (2003) puts it more bluntly: “there’s a word for those who believe race is
not a significant factor in white success: delusional” (p. 166).
Racism Hurts All

Another challenge to overcoming racism and discrimination is determining
how best to show Americans that racism hurts all of us. Rothstein (2017) puts
it this way:
African Americans of course, suffer from our evasion [of the truth about
historic de jure segregation], but so, too, does the nation as a whole, as
do Whites in particular. We in the U.S. have greater political and social
conflict because we must add unfamiliarity with fellow citizens of different racial
backgrounds to the challenges we confront in resolving legitimate disagreements
about public issues. Racial polarization stemming from our separateness
has corrupted working-class voters to mobilize them with racial appeals.
(p. 195; emphasis added)
As evidence of that unfamiliarity, according to the Pew Research Center

(2019), only “About one-in-four whites have a lot of daily interaction with
blacks, Hispanics.” 7
We believe that in confronting and combating racism, one key to success
is proposing and acting on approaches and remedies that do not simply place
blame on individuals, governmental agencies, or organizations for systemic bias
in their rules and laws. Rather, remedies should focus at least in part on the
shared harm to the organization, community, and broader society.
Jim Hill, former treasurer of the state of Oregon and a former state senator,
admonishes that, as many powerful and rich interests in the United States seek
to divide Blacks and Whites by appealing to the fear and anger of the latter,
white people [are] suffering in ways that only used to happen to under-
privileged “minorities.” . . . Between 1999 and 2013, white Americans
between the ages of 45 and 54 began dying at a sharply increased rate,
while the death rate for every other age group, race, and ethnicity actually
declined. . . . The main causes of death were suicide, substance abuse,
a lcoholic liver disease, and overdoses of heroin and prescription opiates.
(Hill, 2016, p. 130)
Hill does not explicitly draw a causal connection between racism and anger,
and illness and death in White Americans, but we believe that such a link is
plausible and worthy of further exploration and research. Carter, Lau, Kirkinis,
and Johnson (2017), on the other hand, did find evidence of a “direct relation
between racial discrimination and psychological distress,” in a meta-analytical
study of 105 studies on the relationships between racial discrimination and
health outcomes among racial-ethnic minority Americans published between
2000 and 2011. Findings confirmed by Carter, Johnson, et al. (2019), in a more
extensive meta-analysis using 242 studies.
Kendi (2017) notes that “although some Whites fight white supremacy and
do not endorse “white common sense” [i.e., that Whites are superior to oth-
ers], most subscribe to substantial portions of it in a casual, uncritical fashion
that helps sustain the prevailing racial order” (p. 11). A significant obstacle to
overcoming racism is that many of us who are White do not confront racism
in part because it appears to be in our self-interest not to do so, even as we are
demeaned by our tacit (or active) participation in systems that unfairly privi-
lege us. Nonetheless, the deck of opportunities and privileges is almost always
stacked in our favor—and those of us who are White are often oblivious to this
imbalance based on discrimination against people of color and the resultant

benefits that accrue without merit to us. Many Whites think that being treated
better than people of color is somehow normal because discriminatory treat-
ment is rarely directed at them. The daily benefits and costs of race and racism
are often ignored or denied, as our laws and practices, and even the judgments
of our courts, have historically favored Whites.
U.S. Federal Courts and Race: A Brief

Historical Overview
It is seldom acknowledged and often denied that racial bias evolved from a
socially approved version of systemic racism to a subtler form of racial bias
that occurred as a response to the social activism of the 1950s. The protests
and activities for racial reform of the 1950s and 1960s led to the dismantling
of the elaborate system of (legal) racial segregation and racial oppression. Some
contend that over time racism became less obvious and shifted from blatant
exclusion and racial hostility to systems and interpersonal mechanisms of ex-
clusion, denial, and blocked opportunity. In previous centuries, the tools and
instruments employed to establish slavery and legal segregation were laws
passed by local and state legislators. Most were upheld by the courts. In both
slavery and legal racial oppression, the exclusions were total and acts of terror
were prominent features of both systems. People of color—Black people in
particular—were not able to learn, seek medical care, hold jobs, or even die
and be laid to rest in the manner that they chose. Their actions and labors were
neither theirs nor their heirs. In the years after Reconstruction, it was as if legal
rights were non-existent when the circumstances of Blacks were at issue:
The law failed black people, not simply because [the laws were] . . .
inadequate, but because when they needed it most for their physical safety
it deserted them entirely. Laws that emasculated the right to vote posed
an ominous handicap to their [Blacks’] participation in government
policy-making; laws that required segregation in public facilities consti-
tuted a humiliation to the spirit. But it was the absolute refusal of the law
to protect them from random and organized violence that enabled the
v irtual re-enslavement of a race so recently freed.
(Bell, 2008, p. 229)
Efforts to reduce these racial injustices during Reconstruction after the Civil
War and during the civil rights era have been brief and short-lived. Today, the
same system of racial stratification, the one in place before the Civil War still
exists, albeit in different forms. There is still a social and economic caste system
wherein people of color are at the lowest rungs. Different laws are used to main-
tain the caste system and the racial hierarchy; albeit that these laws are—on the
surface—race neutral.
During and following Reconstruction, laws, mostly federal, were passed to

reduce the effects of racial oppression; at the same time, these laws were limited
or openly opposed at the state or local level or through custom and acts of terror
(e.g., by the Ku Klux Klan in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, in particu-
lar). As a result, racism and racial discrimination remained core features of the
country and, in spite of the presumed legal prohibitions, access and opportunity
were still denied to the majority of Americans of color throughout the 19th,
20th, and even the early 21st centuries (Packard, 2002).
To illustrate, after several decades of social and political activism in the 1950s
and 1960s on the part of Black and White Americans, the Civil Rights Act
of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 were passed. These acts included
prohibitions against segregation in public accommodations and discrimination
by race in voting, and made employment discrimination illegal. The 1964 act
provided legal options for those who were targets of racial discrimination, and a
large number of legal claims were filed seeking relief from racial discrimination
(i.e., disparate treatment and impact).
Over time, however, the U.S. Supreme Court and other courts limited
the nature of remedies and narrowed legal interpretations of how plaintiffs
could claim and prove racial discrimination. The courts permitted defendants
to assert what has been called the “business necessity” defense, meaning that
defendants could use nonracial explanations to refute charges of racial discrim-
ination even when such actions could have a racially biased effect (Bell, 2000).
Traditionally, discrimination cases have been legally analyzed as a game of “hot
potato.” The plaintiff would first have the burden of showing a prima facie case
of discrimination. If the plaintiff succeeded, the defendant would then have
the burden of showing there was a nondiscriminatory reason for the way the
defendant treated the plaintiff. If the defendant failed to carry that burden, the
plaintiff won. If the defendant succeeded, the burden would then shift back to
the plaintiff to show that the defendant’s reason was really only a pretext for dis-
crimination. The case would finally turn on whether the plaintiff succeeded in
showing that the nondiscriminatory reason was such a pretext (Green v. Rancho
Santa Margarita Mortgage Co., 1994).
The Civil Rights Act of 1991 was passed partly in response to court
decisions that limited legal redress provided by Title VII of the 1964 Civil
Rights Act and to extend provisions of the original 1964 act. As Bell (2000)
noted,
the 1991 Civil Rights Act reformulated standards of federal discrimi-

nation law that had been the subject of seven recent decisions of the
United States Supreme Court, which had made it more difficult for
employee plaintiffs to plead, prove, recover for unlawful employment
discrimination.
(p. 807)
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is known for its provisions associated with racial
discrimination, although the statute did not specifically define what consti-
tuted discrimination and did not specifically define race. Thus, core notions
(i.e., race, discrimination) that were the foundation of the laws were vague and
undefined. This allowed social conventions and customs to prevail in both the
law and mental health practice. Despite the lack of definitions in the civil rights
legislation, courts recognized the existence of racially hostile environments
and racial harassment, yet usually only when the conduct was severe and long
in duration. In 1971, a racially hostile work environment was first recognized
in Rogers v. EEOC (1971; see Buff, 1995). The courts recognized quid pro quo
sexual harassment as early as 1976, and the notion of a hostile work environ-
ment or harassment was extended to “sex” to protect women in 1982 in Hensen
v. City of Dundee by the Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit (Buff, 1995).8
Even though laws prohibiting racial discrimination and harassment pre-
date laws prohibiting sexual discrimination and harassment (using the legal
definitions), the standards and remedies for each type of discrimination have
been different. Throughout every level of substantiating a harassment claim,
even for similar fact patterns, the courts have tended to require less from the
plaintiff in sexual harassment than in racial harassment cases. This difference
in treatment can be found in the frequency of incidents, the standard used to
assess “sufficiently severe and [or] pervasive,” and the standards for determin-
ing liability throughout most phases of evidentiary production. Feagin and
McKinney (2003) note that “the courts have only occasionally accepted the
kind of evidence to demonstrate a hostile racial climate that they accept to
demonstrate a hostile sexual climate” (p. 204). Chew and Kelly (2006) note that
their “study indicates that plaintiffs in racial harassment cases are more likely
than plaintiffs in sexual harassment cases to fare poorly” (p. 54). As evidenced
in the finding, “plaintiffs in sexual harassment cases win 48% of the time or
are twice as likely to succeed with their complaints and efforts at legal redress”
(Chew & Kelly, 2006, p. 54n17). Thus, the laws seem to present onerous obsta-
cles and hurdles that limit people of color’s options for legal redress.
Although legally defined racial discrimination and harassment (hostile work
and disparate treatment) claims can also be brought under Section 1981 of the
Civil Rights Act of 1866, the preponderance of both types of cases (in employ-
ment settings) have been filed under Title VII of the Civil Rights Acts of 1964
and 1991. Our overview of the case law demonstrates that racial encounters
have normally been treated differently (as compared to sexual encounters) by
the courts and illustrates how legal decision making is stuck in the past. In
general, the courts’ level of requisite harshness of abuse for racial harassment
claims is higher than for sexual harassment. The courts have required in many
cases that such situations reach a height that is almost violent in nature, anal-
ogous to old-fashioned forms of overt race-related behavior (see, for exam-
ple, West v. Philadelphia Elec. Co., 1995; Brumback v. Callas Contractors, 1995).
In the complementary sexual harassment cases, sexual innuendo has often been
found to be enough to maintain the claim (Watts v. Kroger, 1999). The courts’
treatment of these similar instances of harassment is indicative of the differing
weight given to similar evidence in race and sexual harassment claims for the
plaintiffs to prevail, even though people subjugated to race-based incidents
could have been emotionally harmed in ways not captured by current mental
health assessment approaches. To be clear – we are advocating for the level of
scrutiny and standards for racial harassment cases that currently exists for sex-
ual harassment claims, not an increased burden on plaintiffs to establish sexual
harassment claims.
Finally, in two landmark cases, the U.S. Supreme Court developed a stan-
dard for determining employer liability that only explicitly applies to sexual
harassment (Burlington Industries Inc. v. Ellerth, 1998; Faragher v. City of Boca Raton,
1998). After the Faragher and Ellerth decisions, employers could be held vicari-
ously liable for a negative, tangible employment action exercised by supervisors
while acting within the scope of their employment, if the action was sexually
motivated. The U.S. Supreme Court essentially eliminated the distinctions of
“quid pro quo” and “hostile work environment” harassment as substantively
relevant to the prima facie case in a sexual harassment claim (Meritor Savings
Bank v. Vinson, 1986). This new framework is usually not applied to racial
harassment cases where a tangible employment action has taken place, however.
That is, liability will only attach if the employer knew or should have known,
through exercising reasonable care, of the legally prohibited racial harassment
or hostile work environment. Some contend that the legislatures intended for
courts to decide sexual and racial discrimination or harassment cases using the
same standards for race and sex. Unfortunately, social science research, legal
scholarship, and the courts have not been employing the same standards with
respect to each type of case, nor have race-based experiences been given suffi-
cient attention by legal and social science researchers and scholars.
This brief review illustrates how race and sex are treated differently in legal
practice. The fact patterns judged to violate the law point to a need for new
ways to think about contemporary racial injustice, since many of those patterns
have been deemed violations only if they include blatant and egregious expres-
sions of racism.
Mental Health and Well-Being

Similar to physical health and well-being, mental health and well-being are
negatively affected by racism (whether intentional, negligent, or systemic), for
both the oppressed and oppressor. At the center of our work and research,
we see a potential integration of these two aspects of race and racism: Mental
health and the law hold a potentially powerful synergy in leading us to legal
reforms. The win/lose, zero-sum game approaches to legal reforms of the past
to issues of race and racism, where too often oppressed Blacks and lower socio-
economic class Whites were pitted against each other (see Hill, 2016), seem at
best counterproductive and at worst sinister, and in any event obsolete.
In 2012, to strike at racism by documenting the psychological and emotional
harm that can befall its targets, we authored a law review article that linked
race-related stress and trauma in the workplace with legal theory and strate-
gies to seek redress under tort law (Carter & Scheuermann, 2012). We believe
that the assessment of race-related emotional harm will strengthen legal cases
by supporting the addition of claims of intentional (or negligent) infliction of
emotional distress, where appropriate, to unlawful racial harassment and racial
discrimination litigation, which are often based in other sources of law.
We argue that employing the legal strategy that we outline for workplaces
and other environments and situations constitutes a viable legal approach that
draws on emerging psychological research and empirical evidence documenting
how people subjugated to racism are harmed and injured by such experiences.
Emotional distress claims typically have not been used in racial discrimination
or racial harassment claims. We argue that this is a feasible and appropriate
strategy that could be a keystone in a stronger foundation for legal action with
respect to seeking justice for racism.
Moving forward in identifying a basis and need for action, Carter and col-
leagues (2017, 2019) demonstrate the connection of racism to negative mental
health outcomes.9 In a similar vein, Lopez (2000) notes that
despite the pervasive influence of race in our lives and in U.S. law, a
review of opinions and articles by judges and legal academics reveals a
startling fact: Few seem to know what race is and is not. Today most
judges and scholars accept the common wisdom concerning race, with-
out pausing to examine the fallacies and fictions on which ideas of race
depend. In U.S. society “a kind of ‘racial etiquette’ exists, a set of inter-
pretive codes and racial meanings which operate in the interactions of
daily life. . . . Race becomes ‘common sense,’—a way of comprehending,
explaining and acting in the world” [Omi & Winant, 1986, 62]. This
social etiquette of common ignorance is readily apparent in the legal discourse of race.
The fallacies and fictions that Lopez describes have fostered a projection of
narrow, personal views by many of these legal professionals onto the heretofore
intractable problems of racism in our legal systems. Related fallacies include a
commonly held belief that White working-class people are losing ground (i.e.,
income, wealth) because of policies that were put into place to improve the lives
of Black people (e.g., public assistance, affirmative action, Aid to Families with
Dependent Children). Professor Paul F. Campos (2017) dispels this myth in his
New York Times opinion piece “White Economic Privilege Is Alive and Well”:
The income gap between black and white working-class Americans, like
the gap between black and white Americans at every income level, re-
mains every bit as extreme as it was five decades ago (this is also true of
the income gap between Hispanic and white Americans).
In 2015—the most recent year for which data are available—black
households at the 20th and 40th percentiles of household income earned
an average of 55 percent as much as white households at those same per-
centiles. This is exactly the same figure as in 1967.
Rising income and wealth inequality (for both Whites and people of color) also
“widens the justice gap,” notes Frank (2018):
More than 70 percent of low-income American households had been

involved in eviction cases, labor law cases, and other civil legal disputes
during the preceding year, and in more than 80 percent of those cases, they
lacked effective legal representation.
Gilles (2016) pointedly notes that “. . . as contemporary judges see fewer civil cases
brought by or on behalf of poor people, one might expect that they will grow
further out of touch with and more ill-equipped to manage these claims” (p. 1531).
The entrenched and growing problem of wealth disparity between Whites
and Blacks is symptomatic of the systemic racism in the United States. As
we note throughout the book, racism is both an individual and a collective
phenomenon.
To understand the racism and discrimination that persists to this day in the
United States, albeit in forms different than 400 or even 60 years ago, one must
consider the tacit (and often intentional) pact that Whites have made with each
other across our history, particularly working-class Whites with those better
off financially (and in positions of power). Bell (2008) tells us that “whites of
widely varying socio-economic status employ white supremacy as a catalyst
to negotiate policy differences, often through compromises that sacrifice the
rights of blacks.” Bell goes on to say that “slavery also provided property-less
whites with a property in their whiteness” (p. 28). There is a heavy cost to
Whites as well as Blacks in this “bargain.” Progress will be made, Bell asserts,
when Whites recognize
that their property in being white has been purchased for too much and
has netted them only the opportunity, as Woodward (2005) put it, “to
hoard sufficient racism in their bosom to feel superior to blacks while
working at black’s wages.” The cost of racial discrimination is levied
against us all.
(p. 32)
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
The Project Gutenberg eBook of Der Geist der
Gotik
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United
States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with
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included with this ebook or online at www.gutenberg.org. If you
are not located in the United States, you will have to check the
laws of the country where you are located before using this
eBook.
Title: Der Geist der Gotik
Author: Karl Scheffler
Release date: September 9, 2023 [eBook #71602]
Language: German
Original publication: Leipzig: Insel-Verlag, 1917
Credits: The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at

https://www.pgdp.net
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DER GEIST

DER GOTIK ***
Anmerkungen zur Transkription
Der vorliegende Text wurde anhand der Buchausgabe von 1917 so weit wie möglich
originalgetreu wiedergegeben. Typographische Fehler wurden stillschweigend korrigiert.
Ungewöhnliche und heute nicht mehr verwendete Schreibweisen bleiben gegenüber dem
Original unverändert; fremdsprachliche Ausdrücke wurden nicht korrigiert.
Die Fußnoten wurden an das Ende des Texts verschoben.
Abhängig von der im jeweiligen Lesegerät installierten Schriftart können die im Original
g e s p e r r t gedruckten Passagen gesperrt, in serifenloser Schrift, oder aber sowohl
serifenlos als auch gesperrt erscheinen.
Der Geist der Gotik
Von
Karl Scheffler
Mit 107 Abbildungen
Im Insel-Verlag zu Leipzig
1917
Vorwort
Die Gedanken, die auf den folgenden Seiten ausgesprochen

sind, haben mich zwei Jahrzehnte lang beschäftigt. In vielen meiner
Arbeiten sind sie schon erörtert worden, ja, wer sich die Mühe gibt,
danach zu suchen, findet sie in meiner ganzen Kunstauffassung. Ich
habe mich entschlossen, sie mehr systematisch nun
zusammenzufassen, weil die Zeit dafür günstig scheint. In den
letzten Jahren haben einige unserer besten Kunsttheoretiker
verwandte Anschauungen vertreten und sie — jeder in seiner Weise
— zu Werkzeugen der Forschung gemacht. Und es mehren sich die
Anzeichen, daß in der Kunstbetrachtung überhaupt ein
grundsätzlicher Wandel vor sich geht. Wenn mehrere gute Köpfe
gleichzeitig auf dieselbe Idee verfallen, so ist damit bewiesen, daß
es sich nicht um subjektive Spekulationen handelt, sondern um eine
objektive Erkenntnis. Es mag darum nützlich sein, das Problem
einmal in seinem ganzen Umfang wenigstens anzudeuten.
Zu der Wichtigkeit, die ich dem Gedanken von der Polarität der
Kunst beimesse, steht das Volumen dieses Buches freilich in keinem
Verhältnis. Ich benutze die Gelegenheit, das Bekenntnis abzulegen,
daß ich dieser Arbeit über den „Geist der Gotik“ gern viele Jahre
meines Lebens gewidmet hätte, daß ich sie am liebsten erweitern
möchte zu einem umfangreichen, auf genauen Spezialforschungen
und vielen Reiseerlebnissen beruhenden, von einem reichen
wissenschaftlichen Abbildungsmaterial erläuterten Werk. Die
Erfüllung dieses Wunsches ist mir dauernd versagt. Notgedrungen
begnüge ich mich, das schöne Problem aphoristisch zu behandeln
und intuitiv gewonnene Resultate vorzulegen, ohne sie im einzelnen
auch empirisch zu beweisen. Ich bin mir bewußt, daß dieses nicht
eigentlich ein Buch ist, sondern nur etwas wie eine Einleitung zu
dem Werk, das mir vorschwebt. Es ist nur eine Disposition; jeder
kleine Abschnitt könnte zu einem ausführlichen Band erweitert
werden.
Die Abbildungen sollen dem allgemein Gesagten als einige
konkrete Beispiele zur Seite stehen. Manches hätte
charakteristischer gewählt werden können, wenn alle gewünschten
photographischen Vorlagen in der Kriegszeit hätten beschafft
werden können. Um so dankbarer bin ich denen, die mir geholfen
haben, dieses Resultat wenigstens zu erzielen. Für einige schwer
erreichbare Vorlagen bin ich vor allem zu Dank verpflichtet den
Herren Otto Bartning, Professor Peter Behrens, Reg.-Baumeister
Ernst Boerschmann, Prof. Dr. Heinr. Bulle, Dr. Curt Glaser,
Geheimrat Dr. Peter Jessen, Karl Robert Langewiesche, Hans von
Müller, Stadtbaurat Prof. Hans Poelzig, Dr. Emil Waldmann, Frau
Hedwig Fechheimer und den Verlagen Bruno Cassirer, Georg Hirth,
Julius Hoffmann, Wilhelm Meyer-Ilschen und E. A. Seemann.
I. Die Lehre vom Ideal
Nach einem Ausspruch Goethes deutet alles Theoretisieren auf

ein Stocken oder Nachlassen der schöpferischen Kräfte. Dieses
Wort hat die Kraft eines Lehrsatzes und gilt ebensowohl für die
Völker wie für die Individuen. Aus ihm allein könnte man schon
schließen, wenn nicht andere Anzeichen noch in Fülle vorhanden
wären, daß es kritische Jahre für die schöpferischen Kräfte der
Kunst gewesen sein müssen, als jene groß gedachten Theorien
aufkamen, die nun schon einhundertundfünfzig Jahre lang das
geistige Leben Europas beherrschen und deren Schöpfer in
Deutschland so große Geister wie Winckelmann, Lessing und
Goethe gewesen sind. Die Theorien sind in dem Augenblick
aufgetreten, als in den Künsten mit den Formen des Barock und
Rokoko die ursprüngliche Gestaltungskraft abklang und als mit dem
Klassizismus eine kritisch abgeleitete Kunst, eine Bildungskunst,
heraufkam. Auch jetzt war die Theorie, wie edel die Gedanken und
Forderungen, wie genial die Vertreter immer sein mochten, ein
Notprodukt; ihre Verkünder standen im Dienste einer
Kultursehnsucht, sie fühlten sich — selbst schöpferische Geister —
unbefriedigt von der Zeit und wollten eine allgemeine
Vollkommenheit erzwingen. Wer die Kunsttheorien von Männern wie
Lessing oder Goethe kritisiert, muß betonen, daß sie und viele ihrer
Genossen als Persönlichkeiten und Begabungen viel mehr waren als
Theoretiker — selbst dann noch, wenn man von ihren poetischen
Arbeiten absieht. So strittig ihre Kunstlehren sind, so groß stehen
ihre kunsttheoretischen Schriften doch da als Denkmale eines
klassischen Schreibstils und einer vorbildlichen Methode,
Gedankenfolgen mit architektonischer Klarheit zu entwickeln. Diese
Männer werden nicht kleiner, weil sie in einem Punkte geirrt haben,
denn ihr Irrtum war der einer ganzen Zeit, er war eine notwendige
Folge des „Stockens oder Nachlassens der schöpferischen Kräfte“ in
den bildenden Künsten. Heute, wo diese Kräfte sich wieder regen,
würden so lebendige Geister ganz woanders stehen. Lessing hätte
in unsern Tagen wahrscheinlich mit seiner zielsicheren Logik einen
Anti-Laokoon geschrieben und würde orthodoxe Anhänger der
Laokoonlehre mit eben jenem heiteren Witz verfolgen, der seinerzeit
die Herren Lange und Goeze getroffen hat. Und Goethe würde
vielleicht den herrlichen Instinkten seiner Jugend glauben, würde
mehr seiner eingeborenen gotischen Natur folgen, die den „Faust“
hervorgebracht hat, und nicht einem abgeleiteten klassizistischen
Bildungsideal so unbedingt vertrauen.
Die Gefahr der von unsern Klassikern meisterhaft formulierten
Kunsttheorien, die den Deutschen noch jetzt heilig sind, besteht
darin, daß diese Lehren nur die Hälfte der menschlichen Kunstkraft
gelten lassen. Die Kunst ist von diesen großen Begriffsreinigern
nicht als eine Ganzheit mit zwei Polen erfaßt und dargestellt worden.
Sie lebten auf der einen Hemisphäre der Kunst und vergnügten sich
dort an ihren Spekulationen; die andere Halbkugel blieb für sie im
Dämmer, und sie sprachen davon mit einem gewissen Schauder.
Keiner glaubte, daß auch diese andere Welt einmal im Mittagslicht
daliegen könne. Und doch war unter den Gesetzgebern wenigstens
einer, der vor allen andern berufen gewesen wäre, eine neue Lehre
von dem Zusammenhang aller bildenden Kräfte zu geben: Goethe.
Während auf ihn mehr oder weniger alle Lehren zurückweisen, die
die Natur als ein unzerstörbares Ganzes nehmen, während er in der
Natur an Polarität und Stetigkeit, an Metamorphosen und an feste
Gesetze des Formwerdens glaubte, hat er die Kunst — die doch
eine zweite Natur, eine Natur auf dem Wege über den menschlichen
Willen und die menschliche Erkenntniskraft ist — nicht so umfassend
gesehen. Vielleicht weil er Künstler war und sich als solcher für ein
bestimmtes Klima entscheiden mußte. An die Formen der Kunst ist
er kritisch, ausscheidend herangetreten, hat sich für eine bestimmte
Formenwelt begeistert und eine andere verurteilt. Überzeugt,
durchaus objektiv vorzugehen, hat er — und mit ihm seine ganze
Zeit — tendenzvoll gewertet. Und so ist der Begriff zur Herrschaft
gelangt. Es war das Unglück jener Zeit, daß die Theorie nicht einer
lebendigen Kunst folgte, sondern eine neue Kunst schaffen wollte,
daß sie sich über den Künstler stellte, anstatt neben und unter ihn.
Auch waren die großen Werke der Vergangenheit, die den
Theoretikern als Muster galten, nur unvollkommen aus Kopien und
Nachahmungen bekannt; die bedeutendsten Beispiele waren noch
nicht gefunden. Es war fast unmöglich, von konkreten Vorbildern aus
ein wünschenswertes Ganzes zu denken. Im Gegenteil: von einem
für wünschenswert gehaltenen Ganzen aus wurden Forderungen für
alles einzelne festgestellt. Und dieses eben ist der Weg des
Begriffes. Nichts ist dem Denken über Kunst gefährlicher als Mangel
an Anschauungsstoff und Herrschaft des Begriffs. Denn jeder
Begriff, so grenzenlos er scheinen mag, ist hart begrenzt und stößt
immer irgendwo mißtönend mit der Unendlichkeit des Lebens
zusammen. Wogegen in jeder sinnlich geborenen Empfindung
immer das ganze Lebensgefühl enthalten ist, etwa so, wie in jedem
Naturausschnitt die ganze Natur zu sein scheint. Dieses ist das
große Geheimnis des reinen Gefühls: daß im Augenblick das Ewige,
im Beschränkten das Unbegrenzte, im Zufälligen das Gesetzmäßige
aufglänzen. Nur wer die Kunst aus der Erfahrung der sinnlichen
Empfindungen denkt, hat sie in ihrer Totalität; wer sie begrifflich
meistern will, besitzt sie immer nur in Teilen. Darum haben die
schaffenden Künstler, in all ihrer Einseitigkeit, ein so fruchtbares
Verhältnis zur Kunst. Sie wählen, gruppieren und werten aus dem
Instinkt, ihre Gedanken werden von der leidenschaftlichen Liebe
geboren, während sich beim Theoretiker nicht selten die Liebe erst
am Gedanken entzündet.
Als Kind eines genialisch gesteigerten Denkens über die Kunst
ist nun vor anderthalb Jahrhunderten eine Idee hervorgetreten, die
freilich etwas Blendendes hat und die darum auch heute noch fast
unumschränkt herrscht. Sie spricht sich aus in dem Lehrsatz, der
Endzweck der Künste sei „das Schöne“, und die Wirkung der Künste
auf das menschliche Gemüt müsse ein Vergnügen sein. Lessing
sagt im „Laokoon“, daß bei den Alten die Schönheit das höchste
Gesetz der bildenden Künste gewesen wäre, und daß darum alles
andere, auch von uns, der Schönheit untergeordnet werden müsse.
Diesem Lehrsatz ist die Frage entgegenzustellen: Was ist
Schönheit? Ist Schönheit etwas ein für allemal Feststehendes? Fragt
man die Kunstgeschichte um Rat, so zeigt es sich bald, daß die
Schönheit, wie unsere Klassiker sie verstanden, nicht das Endziel
der Künste sein kann, sondern daß sie eine Begleiterscheinung ist,
ähnlich etwa wie die Wohlgestalt des menschlichen Körpers nicht
der Zweck, sondern eine von selbst sich ergebende Eigenschaft der
organisierenden Natur ist.
Gäbe es eine absolute Schönheit in der Kunst und dürfte
folgerichtig nur sie gelten, so wäre alles andere neben ihr niederen
Grades. Das haben unsere Theoretiker ja auch behauptet. Man ist
sogar so weit gegangen, zu sagen, diese Schönheit wäre nur einmal
einem auserwählten kleinen Volke, den Griechen, gelungen, und die
Nachgeborenen könnten nichts Besseres tun, als sich nach ihnen
richten. Das kommt aber einer Bankerotterklärung der Menschheit
gleich. Es ist unmöglich, das Wesen der Kunst von der Schönheit
aus zu bestimmen. Der junge Goethe war dem Zentrum des
Problems näher, als er, hingerissen von einem Erlebnis des Auges,
vor dem Straßburger Münster stand und das Wort fand: „Die Kunst
ist lange bildend, ehe sie schön ist, und doch so wahre, große Kunst
ja oft wahrer und größer, als die schöne selbst.“ Mit diesem Wort ist
das Wesen der Kunst wie mit einer einzigen Linie umschrieben. Der
Wille der Kunst ist es, bildend zu sein und ein Inneres so
auszudrücken, daß es ein Äußeres wird. Der Ausdruck eines inneren
Zustandes, das ist das Entscheidende. Die Schönheit umfaßt nur die
Hälfte, sie zielt auf den Genuß, sie befriedigt
Glückseligkeitsbedürfnisse und das Verlangen nach ruhiger, heiterer
Harmonie. Das Glück aber ist in der Kunst ebensowenig das
Höchste wie im Leben. Um ein Wort Lessings zu variieren: auch in
der Kunst ist das Streben nach Glück und Schönheit mehr als der
Besitz von beiden. Der Welt des Kunstgefühls gehören ebensowohl
die Empfindungen des Schreckens, die Dissonanzen des
Charakteristischen, die Monumentalität des Erhabenen an. Auch die
Formen des Willens, die das Groteske erzeugen, gehören zur Kunst;
denn die Kunst ist vor allem ein Akt des Willens und darum ihrer
Natur nach elementar. Auch sie setzt vor die Form das Chaos, vor
die Harmonie das Übermaß und die Urkraft vor die Schönheit. Die
Kunst entsteht im kleinen nicht anders, wie die Welt im großen
entstanden ist. Wie die uns heute umgebende Landschaft kaum
etwas gemein hat mit der von der menschlichen Hand noch
unberührten Landschaft, wie die kultivierte, in soziale Rhythmen
gebrachte Landschaft etwas anderes ist als die vorgeschichtliche,
aus Gottes Hand hervorgegangene, und wie die Schönheit der
vermenschlichten Landschaft nicht höher gewertet werden darf als
die Gewalt der ursprünglichen, so darf auch eine klassizistisch
geglättete und veredelte, so darf auch die „schöne“ Kunst nicht
absichtsvoll der ursprünglichen Kunst als etwas Höheres
entgegengestellt werden. Es darf nicht heißen: dieses ist richtig und
jenes ist falsch, sondern es muß heißen: die Kunst geht lebendig in
Metamorphosen durch die Zeiten dahin, sie kennt nicht „Ziele“, sie
kennt nur Bewegung, und auch für sie ist der Weg das Ziel. Wie kein
einzelner Sterblicher die ganze Wahrheit hat, wie die Wahrheit
vielmehr unter alle ausgeteilt ist, so ist auch die Kunst als Ganzes
nie im Besitz eines einzelnen Volkes oder einer bestimmten Zeit. Alle
Stile zusammen erst sind die Kunst.
Aus der Lehre, das Endziel der Kunst sei die Schönheit, hat sich
folgerichtig die Verkündigung eines Ideals ergeben. Nun hat aber
jedes Ideal etwas Autokratisches, etwas Ausschließendes. Es duldet
nicht seinesgleichen neben sich, es kann seinesgleichen gar nicht
geben, wie die Pyramide nur eine Spitze haben kann. Daneben ist in
jedem Ideal etwas Einschmeichelndes und Betörendes. Es pflegt
den Wahn, es gäbe im Leben und in der Kunst etwas Absolutes, wo
doch alles Sterbliche und von Sterblichen Geschaffene irgendwie
bedingt sein muß. Und indem es angeblich zum Streben nach dem
Höchsten auffordert, lähmt es von vornherein die Flugkraft, weil es
den Strebenden immer mehr oder weniger zur Nachahmung
verdammt und ihn unselbständig macht. Nur unproduktive Menschen
und Zeiten konstruieren das Ideal, sie geben sich mit seiner Hilfe
eine Wichtigkeit, die sie nicht haben; naive Menschen,
willenskräftige Völker tragen ihre Ziele im Instinkt, niemals aber
drücken sie sie begriffsmäßig mit Idealforderungen aus. Wie es denn
auch bezeichnend ist, daß unsere großen Dichter wohl
Idealforderungen für die bildende Kunst aufgestellt haben, nicht aber
für die Kunst, worin sie selbst Meister waren, für die Poesie. In
unserm Falle hat die Idee vom absoluten Ideal in der Kunst unser
Volk, ja, unsere Rasse lange Zeit hindurch blind gemacht für das
eigentlich Bildende der Kunst. Besonders die Deutschen haben
schwer gelitten unter der Idealisierungstheorie, weil sie alle geistigen
Dinge immer bis zur letzten Konsequenz verfolgen und gründlich
sind bis zur Selbstvernichtung. Noch heute ist dem Deutschen das
Wort „Idealismus“ etwas Heiliges, vor dem die Kritik anhält; das Wort
bezeichnet etwas Sittliches. Und doch lehrt die Erfahrung, daß dem
unbedingten Idealismus zumeist der Jüngling verfällt, der Werdende,
der noch nicht mit sich selbst einig Gewordene, der Sehnsüchtige, ja
Unzufriedene. Wendet man diese Erfahrung auf das Ganze an, so
zeigt es sich, daß der deutsche Idealismus, der uns in unseren
Augen über die anderen Völker erhebt und uns zu dem
auserwählten Volke zu machen scheint, auch ein Produkt der Not ist,
ein Mittel, um über eine gewisse Unfertigkeit und Unbegabtheit
hinwegzukommen, und ein Zeichen dafür, daß das Wollen noch
bedenklich größer ist als das Können. Der deutsche Idealismus ist
das Werkzeug einer Schwäche, die Kraft werden möchte. In der
Kunst hat gerade das Ideal die Deutschen seit anderthalb
Jahrhunderten verhindert, das Nächste zu tun, hat ihre Blicke nach
Wolkenkuckucksheim schweifen lassen, wo es besser gewesen
wäre, einfach, vernünftig und besonnen vom Handwerk auszugehen.
Der Idealglaube hat die Tradition verdorben. Er macht das deutsche
Volk ehrwürdig, aber er hat es auch problematisch gemacht; er
verleiht uns — vielleicht — „Wichtigkeit vor Gott“, aber er verhindert
den Einfluß auf die Menschen. Er macht im Inneren unsicher und —
in der Folge — begriffsüchtig, lehrhaft und hochmütig nach außen.
So fruchtbar ein lebendiger Idealismus sein kann, wenn er still und
unbewußt in der Brust des Individuums glüht und alle Taten adelt, so
gefährlich ist er, wenn er als Begriff zum Bewußtsein erwacht und
sich Herrschaft anmaßt. Geht man die Geschichte der deutschen
Kunst in den letzten hundertundfünfzig Jahren durch, so zeigt es
sich, daß das griechische Vollkommenheitsideal zwar eine Kunst aus
dritter und vierter Hand nachhaltig gefördert hat, ja daß es sogar
allgemein eine gewisse edle Afterkultur zu schaffen fähig gewesen
ist; zugleich aber hat es die eigentlich schöpferischen Kräfte, die
naiven Talente bedroht und sie gezwungen, sich abseits zu
entwickeln, es hat die geniale Begabung einsam gemacht und in die
Verbannung getrieben. Und so ist eine tiefe Kluft entstanden, die
quer durch unsere Kultur geht. Dieser stolze Idealismus erweist sich
als ein Danaergeschenk; er macht oft blind für die Grenzlinie, die
Wahrheit von Lüge scheidet und echte Empfindung von
Schwärmerei; er peitscht auf und verhindert doch zugleich das
Schöpferische, er predigt das Absolute und läßt nur das Bedingte
entstehen. Während die Zeit ganz unharmonisch war, ja eben weil
sie es war, hat dieser Idealismus die Harmonie gepredigt. Da aus
sich selber aber niemand imstande war, harmonisch zu werden, so
wurde als Muster in der Kunst der griechische Stil aufgestellt.
Ein Stil! Es ist das Eigentümliche des begrifflichen Idealismus,
daß er lieber von einem Stil redet, als von bestimmten Kunstwerken.
Oder er macht das einzelne Kunstwerk zu einem Stilsymbol. In
Deutschland sind zum Beispiel die einflußreichsten Theorien an ein
Kunstwerk geknüpft worden — an die Laokoongruppe —, das
keineswegs zu den guten griechischen Arbeiten gehört, in dem die
spezifischen Eigenschaften des griechischen Formwillens nur sehr
bedingt enthalten sind, ja das recht eigentlich dem Formenkreis des
griechischen Barock angehört und dessen Lobpreisung von seiten
Lessings, Goethes und ihrer Geistesverwandten beweist, wie sehr
dieses Geschlecht, das so viel von der „edlen Einfalt und stillen
Größe“ der Antike sprach, im Instinkte noch den
Barockempfindungen des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts unterworfen
war. Es ist damals der grundsätzliche Fehler gemacht worden, Stil
und Qualität miteinander zu verwechseln; man meinte, ein
Kunstwerk sei schon wegen seiner Zugehörigkeit zu einem
bestimmten Stil — zum griechischen Stil — gut und besser als jedes
andere. Darin liegt eine folgenschwere Verwechslung der Art mit
dem Grad. Die Art kann überhaupt nicht kritisiert werden, weil sie gar
nicht vom Willen abhängig ist, sie kann nur konstatiert werden,
kritisieren kann man allein den Grad. Kunststile lassen sich
ebensowenig kritisch vergleichen, wie man die Buche mit der Tanne
qualitativ vergleichen darf. Man sagt ja auch nicht, der Granit sei
besser als der Sandstein, man sagt nur, er sei härter. Der Stil eines
Volkes ist der Abdruck seines Willens, seiner ganzen Eigenart, wie
sie im Wind und Wetter der Geschichte geworden ist; auch der Stil
ist ein Naturprodukt, er kann nicht anders sein als er ist und muß
darum hingenommen werden wie ein Schicksal. Er kann nur
naturgeschichtlich beurteilt werden. Es geht ebensowenig an, zu
sagen, der eine Stil sei richtig und der andere sei falsch, wie man
eine Sprache richtig oder falsch nennen darf. Es gibt begünstigte
Kunststile, die sich in einer, viele Hemmungen beseitigenden Umwelt
entwickeln, und es gibt andere, die sich mühsam durchringen
müssen und die dabei eine mehr knorrige Formenwelt
hervorgebracht haben — wie es vokalreiche und konsonantenreiche,
harte und weiche, mehr wohllautende und mehr charakteristische
Sprachen gibt. Man mag so weit gehen, zu sagen, daß es talentvolle
und weniger begabte Völker gibt und daß dieses Mehr oder Weniger
sich deutlich in den Kunststilen ausdrückt. Selbst damit aber hat das
von einem begabten Stil getragene Kunstwerk nichts
Entscheidendes gewonnen; das Entscheidende bleibt immer die
schöpferische Persönlichkeit. Auch eine Sprache kann den Dichter
fördern oder hemmen, sie kann für ihn bis zu gewissen Graden
„dichten und denken“; aber sie kann nicht den Dichter machen. Ein
Stil kann mit seinen Regeln bestenfalls das Schlechte verhindern,
Kunstwerke aber kann er nicht spontan hervorbringen. Kurz: die
Qualität des Kunstwerks ist in den wesentlichen Punkten vom Stil
unabhängig, ja sie beginnt erst jenseits der Stilform. In dieser
Hinsicht ist es von tiefer Bedeutung, daß die großen Kunstwerke
aller Zeiten und Länder einander verwandt erscheinen. Homer ist
dem Dichter des Nibelungenliedes, Sophokles ist Shakespeare
näher verwandt, als Schiller es einem seiner mittelmäßigen
Epigonen ist. Damit ist nicht gesagt, der Stil sei unwesentlich, denn
er ist ja das Formenklima, in dem der Künstler heranwächst; nur darf
die Zugehörigkeit zu bestimmten Stilformen nicht zum Kriterium des
Wertes oder Unwertes gemacht werden. Und das eben ist in
Deutschland, in Europa im letzten Jahrhundert geschehen. Dieser
Vorgang ist um so unnatürlicher, als es eine fremde, in einer
südlichen Kultur einst gewordene Formenwelt gewesen ist, der die
Deutschen sich zugewandt, die sie als Vollkommenheitsideal
verkündet haben. Soll schon ein Stilideal aufgestellt werden, so liegt
es doch am nächsten, die im eigenen Lande organisch
gewachsenen Kunstformen als vorbildlich zu bezeichnen. Der auf
germanische Initiative zurückzuführende gotische Stil aber ist von
den Gesetzgebern unserer Ästhetik geradezu verfemt worden. Als
unsere Literatur auf ihrer Höhe stand, wurde den bildenden Künsten
von den Schöpfern einer klassischen deutschen Schriftsprache eine
fremde Formensprache gezeigt, mit der Forderung, diese müsse das
den Deutschen eigentümliche Idiom werden. So war es, wie gesagt,
in ganz Europa. Aber die anderen Nationen haben verstanden, das
Griechische mehr zu französieren, zu anglisieren, zu italienisieren;
wir allein sind so „objektiv“ gewesen, daß wir nur schüchtern eine
Verdeutschung des Griechischen gewagt haben. Wir haben
geglaubt, glauben es wohl noch heute, es gäbe einen Normalstil.
Wohin diese Meinung geführt hat, das liegt vor aller Augen: sie
hat eine Epigonenkunst gezeugt. Eine Epigonenkunst, die als
Bildungsresultat bewundernswürdig ist, die bei alledem aber wie ein
Laboratoriumserzeugnis erscheint. Aus den Theorien ist eine Kunst
hervorgegangen, die lehr- und lernbar ist, eine gelehrte Kunst, kurz:
die Akademie. Das Streben nach der absoluten Schönheit hat zu
einem trüben Eklektizismus geführt. Und hat zu gleicher Zeit einen
temperamentlosen Naturalismus aufkommen lassen. Denn beides,
Stileklektizismus und Naturalismus, sind einander keineswegs
entgegengesetzt, sie sind miteinander verwandt. In Zeiten, wo aus
den Meisterwerken der Vergangenheit und der Fremde Einzelformen
losgelöst und in anderem Zusammenhang, zu anderen Endzielen
verwandt werden, wo die einst genial gebildeten Formen der Alten
mit gelehrtem Wissen nachgeahmt werden, macht sich der Künstler
auch von der Natur in subalterner Weise abhängig. Das griechische
Ideal konnte nicht eine neue Klassik heraufbeschwören, denn diese
fließt allein aus dem elementaren Willen, es hat nur den
klassizistischen Stil geschaffen. Und das große Naturgefühl der
Alten hat nicht das moderne Naturgefühl selbständig gemacht,
sondern unfrei. Das neunzehnte Jahrhundert ist eine Epoche der
stückweisen Kunst- und Naturnachahmung, der Formflauheit, der
sentimentalischen Ideologie gewesen. Es haben in ihm die Künstler
der mittleren Linie geherrscht, während die wahrhaft Selbständigen
verfolgt und vernachlässigt worden sind. Wir haben uns gewöhnt,
inmitten einer abgeleiteten Bildungskultur zu leben, als sei dieser
Zustand normal. Das heute lebende Geschlecht weilt, vom ersten
Tage seines Daseins ab, in einer unerfreulichen klassizistisch-
naturalistischen Umwelt, entstanden aus dem Kompromiß, den der

Confronting Racism Integrating Mental Health Research Into Legal Strategies and Reforms 1st Edition Robert T Carter Thomas D Scheuermann

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Confronting Racism Integrating Mental

Health Research into Legal Strategies

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Routledge Handbook of Mental Health Law 1st Edition

Practical Strategies in Geriatric Mental Health Cases

This book proposes a comprehensive approach to confronting racism through

Robert T. Carter, Ph.D., is professor emeritus of psychology and ­education

Thomas D. Scheuermann, M.A., J.D., serves on the Graduate Faculty of

Robert T. Carter and Thomas D. Scheuermann

ISBN: 978-1-138-55324-8 (hbk)

1 An Introduction to Racism and What It Means

2 Historical and Contemporary Obstacles to

3 Why Legal Redress Has Been So Difficult 41

4 Undoing Civil Rights: Two Steps Forward, One and

5 The Harm of Encounters with Racial Discrimination 95

6 Reconceptualizing Racism and Presenting a Theory

7 Measuring Race-Based Traumatic Stress Injury as Legally

8 Forensic Assessment of Race-Based Traumatic Stress 155

9 A Legal and Organizational Framework for Confronting

10 Applying the Framework: Confronting Racism and

11 Mental Health Evaluations: Race-Related Mental

12 Integrating the Law and Mental Health: Collaborating

at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, where she also chairs the

Robert T. Carter, Thomas D. Scheuermann

In this book, we propose approaches and a framework for confronting racism

1. Social relations are governed by individual preferences over group

American institutions and professions are designed around the racial-cultural

social science professionals as well as organizational and community leaders.

A Framework on Which to Build

American laws, policies, and practices—just as it did when the foundations of

Although race continues to be a profound and provocative aspect of the

Legal and Mental Health Strategies and Systems: Linked

a facilitates awareness and recognition of the realities of racist encounters

c informs and guides research to gain a fuller understanding of the expe-

A Unique Focus: Concepts and Strategies at the

The Book Is Organized into Four Parts

encounters and their mental health effects, we propose a framework through

5 State approaches to felon disenfranchisement vary tremendously. In Maine and

To confront something and challenge it head-on, it is advisable to understand

It is important to remember that many nations and countries have engaged

prejudice combined with physical differences were the determining factors

The Past Informs the Present

“Let us use history to inspire us to push a country forward, to help us

Obstacles to Confronting and Combating Racism

restrictive zoning ordinances, to collaboration among racist realtors—have con-

It is daunting to confront something that the law holds cannot be considered.

Racism Hurts All

As evidence of that unfamiliarity, according to the Pew Research Center

imbalance based on discrimination against people of color and the resultant

U.S. Federal Courts and Race: A Brief

During and following Reconstruction, laws, mostly federal, were passed to

the 1991 Civil Rights Act reformulated standards of federal discrimi-

Mental Health and Well-Being

More than 70 percent of low-income American households had been

Title: Der Geist der Gotik

Author: Karl Scheffler

Release date: September 9, 2023 [eBook #71602]

Original publication: Leipzig: Insel-Verlag, 1917

Robert T. Carter, Ph.D., is professor emeritus of psychology and education